Bullshit Industry
Is Your Business or Job, Bullshit Industry? Here’s how to tell.
Firstly, no apologies for plugging David Graeber’s theory and the book above.
There, David describes how to tell if we are in a Bullshit job.
Here, I am talking about Bullshit industry.
Systemically, the two are obviously related.
Chances are if we are in a Bullshit job, then we are also in a Bullshit industry.
So this article is probably more relevant to business owners and self employed consultants, etc.
It doesn’t take long, if we know already the concepts of Kardashev money, and why we have to move to it, then we might already see the “Writing on the wall” for our business. But far from it being bad news, it will be something we celebrate, when we really understand it, and actually see it happening:
The Acid Test
The first test we need to apply to the business, is to ask whether or not it can exist in a wholly solar powered world.
The fundamental change which has to come about as a result of going Kardashev 1+, is Kardashev money.
With that, we will see all people with a universal income.
This has to happen, driven by nature and the laws of physics.
We might see that this starts with inflation, and ends with money being equated to live energy, the only source of which is donated, from the sun.
The only resistance to this is human nature. And if that happens to be greater than the will of nature, then we perish as a species, unfortunately.
I did a piece earlier today which illustates the essence of the problem, and the solution, succinctly, I think:
What we should draw from this, is that all employees, and all business folk will have a generous income which removes our need to go to work in anything we don’t believe in.
We might say we are seeing the first signs of it as “The Grand Resignation”.
So if our business is not something we nor anyone else would choose to do voluntarily, just because we believed in it, then we should start to plan for its demise.
And that is really good news for our planet, because without bullshit industry, which depends exclusively on the continuous extraction and supply of capital fuels for all its energy, our planet will be much better off.
And so will we, because the more power we have available to put towards this new voluntary kind of work we do, the more rewards we will see.
Now to llustrate with some examples.
Medium Platform
I started with this one because I know the answer from an earlier analysis, and Medium will be happy to know the outcome:
To be honest the above story was written before all of the information of Kardashev Engineering became apparent to me, but the outcome is the same, Medium is not Bullshit industry.
In fact, if Medium were to create its own money-fuel tree(s), it would quickly become apparent that instead of charging for a subscription, it could be a pioneer outlet of Kardasheve money, by offering it to all members, sourced from surplus of solar product (“Kardashev Product”):
Of course it would want to do that, to maximise its user base, perhaps even becoming “The One”:
Would those working in and for Medium continue to do so voluntarily, if they received free money from other sources?
I would guess so, it is after all a creative outlet that we all participate in mostly voluntarily.
Of course it can be argued we currently get fed more by the algos from those oriented towards their own profit churning out bullshit click-bait, rather than any wish to create, or communicating anything truly beneficial.
But that is a whole other story, often covered elsewhere, even more click-bait. In the end, all of those writers producing bullshit, and those helping them to do so, will disappear, for the same reasons, and the quality of the remainder will be something extraordinary.
So there we see Medium passes the test.
Medium is not a Bullshit Business.
Banks
This one had to come next.
I will admit to some heavy negative bias on my part, due to some heavily negative, even life-threatening experiences at their hands.
But we should always be ready to give anyone a second chance, live and let live. They have a choice to do better, or to go down in history as Bullshit business, it seems to me.
So could banks become solar powered, and still have a part to play in the world that follows?
I would say yes, at least in the short term.
They could announce that in the presence of new information, they are taking a decisive course of action.
The new information would be that we have been practicing a grand energy Ponzi forever, and that they were instrumental in that, not knowing any better, but that now we see a clear way to end the Ponzi, also fixing the global environmental problems.
Then, whilst still being fossil fueled, they could begin to issue the first Kardashev stimuli, backed by forecasted / estimated Kardashev product.
In other words, they could issue the money needed by all people to implement the solar infrastructure we need, to go 100% solar powered.
Where would they get that money from?
Well they could just print it, equating each token to Joules of energy to be received from the sun.
This would be us aligning fiat currency with energy, like Bitcoin and other pow currencies are already aligned:
Will the banks choose to do that?
Pigs might fly.
But in this world becoming crazier by the minute, anything can happen.
So Banks as things stand are Bullshit industry.
But they have a way out, that they might choose to take, which would save us all an awful lot of grief, including them, and probably also an awful lot of lives lost, if they don’t choose to take it. After all, everyone working in Banks would see the end result as something very cool, a generous income for all, even the richest banker.
More to Follow
This has already turned out to be a larger than expected story, so I am inclined to publish as is, and follow up with a second part later if needed, but hopefully you get the idea now.
The same questions can be asked of any business, including governments, and law and order (Will criminals still commit crime, if they are paid not to?), and so on.
You might even be inclined to pre-empt by writing on some examples yourself, which would be cause for me to celebrate, in my own small way.
A deeper question which I would love to explore, or see explored, is what difference this will make to our thinking. Removal of all actual bullshit industry from our physical environment will also remove it from our minds. Imagine never having to worry again about accounts, tax, bills, or where our next job, or business, or profitable acquisition will come from. Imagine how much brain-power that will free up, in every one of us, to concentrate on creating truly beneficial output, that we actually love to do.
For now, thanks for reading.
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Footnote: Sure enough, a part 2 did come along, its here:
