Super-linear scaling and collapse

[GliderGuider]

4. (Contrarian alert:) In this context I'm ambivalent about the value of creativity.

I normally think that our creativity is one of humanity's greatest glories. But when it's framed as being the driving energy behind the activity that is destroying the planet, I wince a little.

I wonder if we'd really be less happy in a world where there wasn't quite so much ever-accelerating mental and physical motion. Where it was OK for people to think, "You know, it doesn't really need to be any better than this." But that leaves me open to charges of cultural imperialism and ethnocentricity, so I shoulder my share of the white man's burden once again and shuffle off down the road looking for creative solutions to things that aren't actually "problems".

But half a mile further on I think, "Fuck that noise!", drop my burden like a hot rock, and sit down with a spliff. Moments later, much better.