Date: 2023-04-11 09:11 pm (UTC)
sdi: Oil painting of the Heliconian Muse whispering inspiration to Hesiod. (Default)
From: [personal profile] sdi
I believe you're focusing on dead authors presently, right? If you have room for an author who is aged-but-alive, I might suggest "Seeing Like a State" by James Scott. His premise is that when a government (or anyone, really, but Scott's an anarchist and so he's talking about governments :) ) measures something, it optimizes for that measure at the expense of all else (including it's long-term sustainability).

A simple example from the first chapter is how a government (I believe one of the various German governments of the 1800s) wanted to optimize timber production on a piece of land, so they chopped down all the trees (getting timber), planted a monocrop of the best-producing species, in 30 years chopped down all the trees (getting lots of timber, hooray), replanted the monocrop, and then found to their dismay that the land was barren and none of the trees they planted grew. Turns out a forest isn't just a collection of trees, who knew?

The book is largely a series of case studies along these lines about various other measures (land use, weights and measures, etc.).

I suppose we're seeing now what happens when one applies such a methodology to the value of a human life?
(will be screened)
(will be screened if not validated)
If you don't have an account you can create one now.
HTML doesn't work in the subject.
More info about formatting

Profile

jprussell: (Default)
Jeff Russell

March 2025

S M T W T F S
      1
2345678
9101112131415
16171819202122
232425262728 29
3031     

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated May. 29th, 2025 12:35 pm
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios