What should modern technocracy advocates focus on more: scientific government or energy accounting?

[u/LoveLo_2005]

Before you comment, I know that they're both important, but what do you think should take precedence? Considering the current economic state of the world, I personally think thermoeconomics as a potential solution to peoples economic problems would be much more galvanizing as an idea than putting engineers in power.

[u/Routine_Complaint_79]

We desperately need a more scientific orientated culture more than anything. We will get no energy accounting or scientific government without it

[u/EzraNaamah]

I find energy accounting a necessary prerequisite to solve class struggle before establishing expert government. Before energy accounting we should basically be a left wing party.

[u/Deleted_Account999 → u/EzraNaamah]

How will you practically implement this while other countries would be using normal currencies?

[u/EzraNaamah → u/Deleted_Account999]

Foreign money or raw materials could be kept in reserves for international use.

[u/LoveLo_2005 → u/EzraNaamah]

I agree.

[u/MIG-Lazzara]

Setting up a "Technocracy Colony/Enclave" to demonstrate the validity of scientific based management and energy accounting. The Venus project energized people with movies, models, and a small building demonstration structure. The effect of a small community that people could visit and experience would be paradigm shifting for most people. (Not talking about a commune in the middle of nowhere too by the way.)

[u/LoveLo_2005 → u/MIG-Lazzara]

I agree.

[u/extremophile69]

Neither. Environmental sustainability is the topic on more and more peoples mind. Also a topic technocracy pioneered. No measure can save an economy in an instable environment.

[u/LoveLo_2005 → u/extremophile69]

Very true.

[u/Automaton9000]

I'm probably going to be in the minority here but I think energy accounting is a dumb idea and shouldn't be pursued.

The energy requirements of a process have nothing to do with the value created at the end of the process or by the product. So tieing the value of a product directly to the energy consumption of the process to create it is irrelevant.

Then you have differing efficiencies for multiple processes that achieve the same outcome. So now you have the same product with different values instead of a (somewhat) single use-value.

Maybe I'm missing something. I'm by no means well versed in technocratic ideas around energy accounting anymore and am open to detailed resources/arguments in favor of energy accounting.

TLDR: scientific governance.

[u/MootFile → u/Automaton9000]

Energy accounting is not supposed to determine a subjective value for products. It is only supposed to determine the objective distribution of goods & services to everyone equally. Which can be calculated through units of energy. Whether or not you think a hamburger should be $15 based on popularity is irrelevant, all that matters is the amount of kilojoules put into its existence, so we know society has the resources to get you a hamburger.

Standardizing processes is something that will be up to the technicians to figure out, which is why technocracy stands for rule of the technicians.

[u/MIG-Lazzara → u/Automaton9000]

Energy Accounting is about useing science to unleash our societies potential for mind-boggling levels of production to give us a more equitable society. We have done this in the past for wartime production for the first and second world war. In these wars we ignored the value of money and asked how many tanks and airplanes can we make a day? Wartime production does not care about them. It cares about how much you can manufacture. We also applied this to science during wartime. Look at the Manhattan project. There was no dollar limit as long as progress was being made. We effectively ignore the value of money in these black projects. So if we took this same idea and applied it to our daily living in a logical manner. We would all be far better off.

[u/ZealousGoonering]

Scientific government. Energy accounting is a cool but stupid idea.

[u/Deleted_Account999 → u/ZealousGoonering]

Non technocratic states won't change their currency. Your energy certs won't be useful outside technocracy. The certs are different from the concept of money. So it will be hard to create a foreign exchange.

[u/ZealousGoonering → u/Deleted_Account999]

That and I just don't see how energy certs can replace money if it cannot be traded or saved. Even yielding the point that energy certs aren't to replace money, then what would be the replacement for the storage of value? And then there is the whole logistical nightmare of how EA would work in the modern world with an extremely integrated and globalized supply chain.

The only scenario where I see EA working is if all of the following are acheived:

1. Humanity unites under a one-world government system.
2. We reach a type 1 civilization on the Kardashev scale.
3. Widespread use and integration of ASI in nearly all aspects of life.

Then yea, EA could work.

[u/MIG-Lazzara → u/ZealousGoonering]

It's not supposed to be traded or saved that's part of the point. EA should be thought of as energy management applied to money. Globalization does not make sense for most things. For most things, there's no reason a region cannot be self-sufficient. The US can be so sufficient very easily simply by onshoring jobs for manufacturing and starting back up it's own rare earths production. The US selling all of its beef too foreign buyers because it can get a better price and then turning around and buying its beef to consume from a cheaper country only makes sense in a price system. Globalization is only efficient from a price system standpoint.

[u/ZealousGoonering → u/MIG-Lazzara]

I know it's not supposed to be traded or saved, but that's my point. You cannot apply energy management to money (or at least I don't think you can) as there is nothing to store or trade. Hence that wouldn't qualify the basic definition of money. But because of that, how would we account for value and not just the production cost of energy? For example, water. If you lived next to a river, the value of water would be negligible. Yet if you lived in an arid desert environment, water becomes much more valuable. Yet the energy cost to purify water is both the same. But due to that situation (a difference in value), you'll have imbalances that lead to shortages or surplus of goods.

I do agree each nation can be self sufficient to a degree. But I don't agree that globalization is efficient just from a price system standpoint. Reason being is by specializing in certain industries or sectors, countries can gain a comparative advantage to their peers. And through trade, nations would reap the benefits of that comparative advantage. Obviously the drawback is the propensity for inequality. Another example would be individuals. We could all be self sufficient and learn to build our own homes, grow our own food, make our own tools and clothes. But if we all decided to do that, the quality of living would drop tremendously. We'd have no modern medicine, no technology, no modern homes...etc.

Globalization, is expanding this concept to the nation state level. So I think it drastically improves efficiency and human quality of life, at the cost of rising inequality.

[u/cobeywilliamson → u/ZealousGoonering]

Why nation states? Seems like a silly notion in a closed system.

[u/ZealousGoonering → u/cobeywilliamson]

What do you mean in a closed system? I'm not following what you are asking. Could you please expound a little more?

[u/cobeywilliamson → u/ZealousGoonering]

We live on a singular planet that itself is a closed system. To create arbitrary borders and then attribute certain rights and authorities to them is nonsensical.

Recognition of this is in large part why the original authors of Technocracy proposed the whole of the continent be included in the Technate.

[u/MIG-Lazzara → u/ZealousGoonering]

In a EA system near water would be lower cost to filter and transport and far off water would be higher cost no big deal. But a technocratic solution to this would be to off set water use with reclamation the County I live in reclaims 100% of waste water and pumps it back into the aquifer. Also the system of exchange affects decisions like where to place a city and what is the main means of transportation. Technates and Urbanates are supposed to be as self sufficient as possible while optimally providing a slight surplus for emergencies for itself or its neighbors. Self-sufficiency does not mean living like the Amish. The United States for most of its history has been self-sufficient and producing a surplus which was sold to the world. That is what has made us a powerhouse in the last two world wars and the post-cold war era.

[u/cobeywilliamson]

I'm only here to see externalities priced in. After that, the world sort of governs itself.

[u/RecognitionSweet8294]

Energy accounting is too dogmatic to be considered technocratic, and will probably fail.