Techno-Optimism Is Rational

Techno-optimists believe technology can solve the world’s most pressing problems. With the right knowledge, we can find solutions to climate change like abundant clean energy. Can we acquire the knowledge to build nuclear fusion reactors? Can we do it in time?

The Beginning of Infinity lays out a detailed argument about why we should be optimistic that we can. We’re already in the habit of transforming inhospitable environments into support systems (we wouldn’t survive a winter day in New York otherwise). We have a way of building knowledge that is error correcting and can build on itself generation after generation. In the fullness of time, all knowledge is attainable and can therefore be transformed into technology used to solve problems.

Techno-pessimism is a parochial error. One must take the position that we lack the ability to make technological solutions to climate change or that it’s not possible in time. The only solution is to limit what we collectively do (e.g. austerity measures and degrowth) but that requires a great deal of optimism that people will work together on an extremely unpopular premise (loss aversion).

There are many instances where technology (and technologists) went wrong—Facebook ruined democracy, nuclear power disasters, weapons, so on. But using this as a reason against techno-optimism is also a parochial error because it presumes that we won’t acquire the knowledge to solve these problems (technology is an expression of knowledge, not knowledge itself).

See also:

  • Holding Two Seemingly Contradictory Ideas in One’s Head

    There is tremendous power in being able to simultaneously hold two ideas in one’s head that appear to be in opposition. Contradictions can create boundaries on thoughts—it’s usually unpleasant to have cognitive dissonance—and can lead to dogma. I’ve found that being able to stick with it, despite the discomfort, can be very powerful.

  • How to Do Great Work (Literature Notes)

    I read How to do great work by Paul Graham. It’s a collection of advice I’ve heard from various places. It sounds wise but it’s impossible to disprove. It leaves the practical parts of applying it to the real world up to the reader. Still, I find myself agreeing with pretty much all of it and it took me a very long time to learn these lessons.

  • Trying to Know the Unknowable Leads to Pessimism

    We do not yet know what we have not discovered and trying to know the unknowable (prophesy) leads to pessimism. A Malthusian catastrophe ends up being wrong because it does not predict knowledge that resulted in efficiency of food production. Similarly the pessimism of energy economics is error laden because it can not predict what new discoveries we will make in social and political systems or new defenses.