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2024 | OriginalPaper | Chapter

2. Finding Potential Integrators

Author : Stefan Brunnhuber

Published in: The Third Culture

Publisher: Springer Nature Switzerland

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Abstract

In this second chapter, three potential integrators are identified that are characteristic of the second Renaissance. (a) A reformed financial sector, which primarily involves an adjusted monetary policy and a new green transition plan; (b) altered mindsets, which can be brought about by contemplative practices, psychedelic drugs and/or educational programmes; (c) new technologies, in particular AI and big data. All three integrators can overcome polarities and reconcile opposites. The chapter also introduces the concepts of ‘metastability’ and ‘fractals’.

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previous chapter Finding the Narrative: Shifting East
next chapter The ‘Two Cultures’ Debate and the Logic of Scientific Revolutions
Footnotes
1
The argument of ‘effective altruism’ is a prominent example. A hedge fund manager could pledge their income to a deworming campaign and do far more good than if they quit their job and became an organic farmer. But this approach operates within the existing financial system and assumes that it functions properly, when the reality is that it is flawed from the ground up. In short, we need to upgrade the system to meet the requirements of the twenty-first century, instead of merely working with or around the existing system.
 
2
Assuming a 3% global growth rate, the total conversion rate (TCR) from fossil to green energy would need to be roughly 5% per year to override the growth dynamic. Any time we build a wind turbine or install a solar panel, we still generate income and revenue that is 79% dependent on fossil energy. This is one reason why we need to upgrade (parallelise) the currency system to incentivise green investments and generate multiple positive second-round effects to help bring about a sustainable future (Brunnhuber 2021b, 2023a).
 
3
One prominent example is the funding gap for the 160 million micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), which amounts to over 5.2 trillion USD globally. Three-quarters of MSMEs do not even have access to bank loans. This is a sign of capital market inefficiency. High interest rates, complex administrative procedures and a lack of collateral mean millions of firms cannot access adequate liquidity. Open banking, where the financial institution has direct access to the balance sheet (data in motion principle), can reduce costs, increase trust and liability, generate bottom-up alternative data and allow secondary debt market scaling (mortgage-backed securities). See People-Centered Internet (2023).
 
4
This includes VAT, a harmonised international corporate tax, an enlarged tax base, reduced tax expenditures and an earmarked ‘sin’ tax. However, any taxation scheme will have multiple downsides: it will require international agreements, it will incur high administrative costs and its steering capacity will be limited due to its regressive nature. Moreover, companies do not have the money to fund their own transition. In an optimistic scenario, global taxation schemes could generate around 250–350 billion USD per year. Taxation is part of the solution, but cannot be the entirety of the financial transition plan.
 
5
If we start prioritising the UN Agenda for Sustainable Development, using an ROI analysis and taking less spectacular but highly efficient and highly preventive measures, we can do more good than by simply providing 175 billion USD in ODA per year. Such measures include investing in education (ROI 1:30), maternity and postnatal health (ROI 1:87), anti-malaria campaigns (ROI 1:48), improved nutrition (ROI 1:33), child vaccination (ROI 1:48) and skilled migration (ROI 1:20); stimulating trade and specialisation (ROI 1:7 for OECD countries and 1:99 for LDCs); and introducing a sin tax on nicotine, sugar and/or alcohol (ROI 1:23). These latter measures could save 4.2 million lives per year and an investment of 35 billion USD/year would have a social benefit of 1.7 trillion USD. See Lomborg (2023).
 
6
Primary prevention refers to preventing harm or damage in the first place; secondary prevention to addressing the future costs of harm or damage that has already occurred; tertiary prevention to management of a chronic state. With regard to the challenges of the Anthropocene (climate change, pandemics, species loss, etc.), we are confronted with a secondary preventive scenario: we have caused the damage already. Now we have to manage the potential future costs associated with that damage. An extended monetary aggregate that gives priority to fiscal policy can serve this purpose.
 
7
See Atlantic Council (2023).
 
8
Meyer, Welpe and Sander (2022), EUBOF (2022).
 
9
Brunnhuber (2021b, 2023a).
 
10
The Nash equilibrium refers to a situation where, given a certain set of rules, opposing agents reach a position in which they are no longer able to collaborate without harming their own position. In order to overcome this lock-in effect, the agents must change the rules of the game or introduce a third party accepted by both agents. Due to multiple lock-in effects, we currently find ourselves in a Nash equilibrium on a global scale: North versus South, state versus market, environment versus economy, and so on. In order to transcend these oppositions, we need to introduce a third party that fundamentally changes the rules of the game and maximises the outcomes for all agents involved. Regulators and central banks could play that role. For Nash’s original account of the eponymous equilibrium, see Nash (1950) or Brunnhuber (2021b).
 
11
The IMF’s special drawing rights (SDRs) are a special case. Over 95% of the 450 billion SDRs (as of 2021) are used by OECD countries and MICs.
 
12
Access to bilateral swap lines is mainly restricted to OECD countries. 99% of least developed countries (LDCs), 95% of landlocked developing countries (LLDCs) and small island developing states (SIDSs) and 70% of middle-income countries (MICs) have no access to such agreements. See Perks et al. (2021).
 
13
Banerjee et al. (2022), Silva et al. (2022).
 
14
To be more precise: the global currency market is the largest and most liquid capital market, with around 7 trillion USD equivalent in turnover per day (!), including all assets and facilities. Injecting an additional 250 billion USD equivalent to buy up the Amazon over one to two years will not have an impact on the face value of any major currency.
 
15
For further details, see Brunnhuber (2021b, 2023a) and the WAAS initiative ‘The TAO of Finance’: https://​new.​worldacademy.​org/​tao-of-finance/​.
 
16
Byers (2014) calls this state ‘deep thinking’: opposites and irregularities can be contained, so that complementarities, fractal correlations, creativity and new learning can occur.
 
17
One of the most powerful frames is the ‘confirmation bias’: we favour information that confirms our existing beliefs and values. Some scholars consider it one of the most misleading aspects of human thinking; see Oswald and Grosjean (2004).
 
18
It should be noted that when it comes to bullshit and fake news, the truth is irrelevant; the liar knows the truth.
 
19
Lung and Dominowski (1985).
 
20
Vervaeke (2020), Wilber (2022).
 
21
This includes post- and transpersonal mental states such as kindness, humility, grace, reverence and gratitude. Terms for these altered mental states include ‘unconditional love’ (or unconditional empathy, unconditional forgiveness), ‘one taste’, ‘nirvana’, ‘absolute emptiness’, ‘samadhi’ and ‘inner peace’.
 
22
There is increasing empirical evidence of an input–output fallacy in education. The amount of input (money, teachers, facilities, electronic devices) is only weakly correlated with output (creativity, productivity, well-being). We need to take a very different, far more radical approach to education. See Brunnhuber (2017, 2021a).
 
23
See Lutz and Klingholz (2017).
 
24
This includes reduced attention span, lack of focus, reduced emotional, social and fine motor skills, a propensity to addiction, reduced development of the prefrontal cortex and the impact of loneliness, particularly in the evolving brain during the first two decades of life. Not to mention the most obvious negative impacts: back problems (due to bad posture) and obesity (due to lack of exercise). See Spitzer (2012, 2019) and the literature he refers to; Spitzer concludes that the higher the investment in IT, the poorer the educational outcome. If we assume five billion smartphone users with over six hours of daily use, we can expect a lot more problems to come.
 
25
The three Cs (creativity, cooperation and critical thinking) are key elements of the human capacity to deal with complex situations, and ones that we should avoid digitalising. These transdisciplinary abilities increase our resilience and will help us to cope with the challenges of the twenty-first century.
 
26
Kast (2019).
 
27
The list could be extended: singing, dancing, speaking several languages (despite the existence of digital language programs), gardening and cooking (despite the existence of robot assistants), playing musical instruments (despite the existence of digital audio).
 
28
Liessmann (2014).
 
29
Neurobiologists have discovered a phenomenon known as the default mode network (DMN), which is most commonly active when a person is not focused on the outside world and the brain is at wakeful rest, such as when that person is daydreaming or letting their mind wander, but it is also active when they think about other people or themselves, when they are remembering the past or when they make plans for the future. The creative mind is able to simultaneously live in a dream state and concentrate on the outside world, which requires the ability to take mental distance from what they are doing and maintain meta-awareness of the thoughts and ideas running through their head. The network activates ‘by default’ when a person is not engaged in a task. We spend about 50% of our waking hours in this kind of ‘off-task’ mental state.
 
30
Creativity is linked to the ability to filter ‘relevant’ and ‘non-relevant’ when there is competing information. We do not follow a closed algorithm, but instead an open, ‘failure-tolerant’ process. A creative person is able to deal with their own inner dysfunctions (trauma, complexes, neuroses), whereas talented people instead follow a tailored rule-based process and optimise a particular skill.
 
31
Gladwell (2008).
 
32
What elements are needed to generate creativity in a group? 1. Rituals and rules that are supported by the group; 2. Social sensitivity, which means role-taking and understanding others; 3. Treating people fairly and giving them equal speaking time; 4. A ‘failure-tolerant’ atmosphere of respect and trust in which people feel able to show weakness. It is interesting to note that the success of a group does not depend on bonuses, IQ, technical equipment, specific institutional arrangements or non-academic qualifications. See Woolley et al. (2010).
 
33
An alternative educational ideal derives emancipatory potential from a different source, emphasising the importance of non-curricular factors such as the student–teacher relationship, mindfulness exercises, sport, food, multisensory learning, silence, breaks, sleep hygiene, social skills, fine and gross motor skills, multilingualism, emotional granularity, ambivalence tolerance, resilience exercises, attention span, discipline and perseverance. These non-curricular factors are often forgotten, underestimated or considered irrelevant, which hinders the development of critical citizens and an open society. See Brunnhuber (2017, 2021a).
 
34
AI can simulate rain, but that rain will not make us wet; it can simulate a meal, but that meal cannot nourish us; it can simulate a companion, but not one we can have children with. That is to say, AI can simulate almost everything, has surpassed the human brain and most of its functions and will create a ‘conscious reality’ in parallel to and beyond our own.
 
35
CAMH (2023), Reiff et al. (2020), Bender and Hellerstein (2022), Sanz et al. (2022).
 
36
All three components (spiritual psychotechnics, education and psychedelic drugs) risk running into the ‘individuality trap’, whereby we overestimate the personal and underestimate the societal and systemic impact of transformational change. In addition, any individual approach depoliticises transformational change and places the entire burden of change on the individual. See Grunwald (2012).
 
37
Mandelbrot (1977, 1983).
 
Literature
Banerjee O et al (2022) Can we avert an Amazon tipping point? Environ Res Lett 17(12):1–12CrossRef
Bender D, Hellerstein DJ (2022) Assessing the risk–benefit profile of classical psychedelics: a clinical review of second-wave psychedelic research. Psychopharmacology (Berl) 239(6):1907–1932CrossRef
Brunnhuber S (2017) Education isn’t education: the creativity response or how to improve the learning curve in our society. Cadmus 3:58–67
Brunnhuber S (2021a) The creativity response—why we have to completely reorganize our education. Foreword to Kunkel O (2021) Neugier Entfesseln! Wie Corona, Klimakrise und Neurowissenschaften die Schule umkrempeln. Visual Ink Publishing, Karlsruhe
Brunnhuber S (2021b) Financing our future: unveiling a parallel digital currency system to fund the SDGs and the common good. Palgrave Macmillan, BasingstokeCrossRef
Brunnhuber S (2023a) Financing our Anthropocene: how Wall Street, Main Street and central banks can manage, fund and hedge our global commons. Springer, ChamCrossRef
Byers W (2014) Deep thinking: what mathematics can tell us about the mind. World Scientific Publishing, Hackensack, NJCrossRef
Gladwell M (2008) Outliers: the story of success. Penguin, London
Grunwald LA (2012) Ende einer Illusion: Warum ökologisch korrekter Konsum die Umwelt nicht rettet. Oekom, MunichCrossRef
Liessmann K (2014) Geisterstunde: Die Praxis der Unbildung: Eine Streitschrift, 4th edn. Paul Zsolnay, Vienna
Lomborg B (2023) Best things first: the 12 most efficient solutions for the world’s poorest and our global SDG promises. Copenhagen Consensus Center, Tewksbury, MA
Lung C, Dominowski RL (1985) Effects of strategy instructions and practice on nine-dot problem solving. J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn 11(4):804–811CrossRef
Lutz W, Klingholz R (2017) Education first! From Martin Luther to sustainable development. African Sun Press, StellenboschCrossRef
Mandelbrot B (1977) Fractals: form, chance and dimension. Freeman, San Francisco
Nash J (1950) Equilibrium points in n-person games. Proc Natl Acad Sci 36(1):48–49CrossRef
Oswald ME, Grosjean S (2004) Confirmation bias. In: Pohl RF (ed) Cognitive illusions: a handbook on fallacies and biases in thinking, judgement and memory. Psychology Press, Hove, pp 79–96
Reiff CM et al (2020) Psychedelics and psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy. Am J Psychiatry 177(5):391–410CrossRef
Sanz C et al (2022) Natural language signatures of psilocybin microdosing. Psychopharmacology (Berl) 239(9):2841–2852CrossRef
Silva JM et al (2022) Minimum costs to conserve 80% of the Brazilian Amazon. Perspect Ecol Conserv 20(3):216–222
Spitzer M (2012) Digitale Demenz: Wie wir uns und unsere Kinder um den Verstand bringen. Droemer, MunichCrossRef
Spitzer M (2019) Die Smartphone Epidemie: Gefahren für Gesundheit, Bildung und Gesellschaft. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart
Woolley AW et al (2010) Evidence for a collective intelligence factor in the performance of human groups. Science 330(6004):686–688CrossRef
Metadata
Title
Finding Potential Integrators
Author
Stefan Brunnhuber
Copyright Year
2024
Book
The Third Culture

Print ISBN: 978-3-031-48112-3

Electronic ISBN: 978-3-031-48113-0

Copyright Year: 2024

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-48113-0_2

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