Why has the human species thrived so well? Is it because of our big brains? Our tendency toward altruism (as impure as it may be)? In a new book called The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves, the science writer Matt Ridley argues it’s because we started doing something very simple: trading ideas and goods. “By exchanging, human beings discovered ‘the division of labor,’ the specialization of efforts and talents for mutual gain,” Ridley writes.
After specialization came continuous innovation (a uniquely human trait) and increased prosperity, all of which made the average person’s life today so much better than in the past.
More controversially, in light of current concerns about the global economy and climate change, Ridley believes that humans will continue along this path of improvement: “Rational optimism holds that the world will pull out of the current crisis because of the way that markets in goods, services, and ideas allow human beings to exchange and specialize honestly for the betterment of all. … It will not be easy, but it is perfectly possible, indeed probable, that in the year 2110, a century after this book is published, humanity will be much, much better off than it is today, and so will the ecology of the planet it inhabits.”
Ridley has offered to field questions on the topic from Freakonomics readers, so ask away in the comments section below. As with past Q&A’s, we’ll post his answers shortly.
Addendum: Ridley answers your questions here.
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Specialization is a need trick, but if human success was driven by this cultural innovation rather than by genetic changes, then why didn’t Neandertal’s pick up specialization during the thousands of years we lived in proximity to them and become at least as succesful as we did?
Also, history is full of examples of civilizational decline; what is rational about believing that it won’t happen again?
Specialization is a neat trick, but if human success was driven by this cultural innovation rather than by genetic changes, then why didn’t Neandertals pick up specialization during the thousands of years we lived in proximity to them and become at least as succesful as we did?
Also, history is full of examples of civilizational decline; what is rational about believing that it won’t happen again?
I’d like to be able to enjoy my own prosperity for longer than a few decades. When will the next major breakthrough in extending the life of humans come and in which field is it going to happen: genetics, robotics, cumputer science, etc?
So yeah. Please explain why the ecology of the planet will be better off in 100 years. Be specific.
I’m interested to hear about the negative cases: i.e., when “continuous innovation” does NOT happen; those long stretches of human experience where innovation did not occur. “Continuous innovation” looks great to us because we’re in the middle of a 500-year run of it. But there is probably a good 25,000-year stretch of modern homo sapiens where little or no innovation occurred… and plenty of parts of the globe where subsistence peoples remained in stasis (in terms of technology, cultural habits, etc.) for hundreds of generations.
I’m a fan of free trade and continuous innovation. However, often there are times where personal incentives lead to roadblocks e.g. when a politician will push for protectionist policies to protect his/her constituents so that he/she can get elected again. Besides voting for politicians that promote free trade and innovation, what can Joe Average do, on a micro-level, to further promote free trade and innovation?
As author of “The Optimism Advantage,” I was intrigued by the premise of Matt’s “The Rational Optimist.” I would agree that optimists do not come from motivational hype; it is earned through a track record of overcoming obstacles. The more obstacles you overcome, the more you believe that you can do it again. That practical optimism is at the heart of the American Dream that has been the cornerstone of American innovation. But the current president is pleading for private sector growth while changing the incentives that drive it. Instead of rewarding optimistic achievement, President Obama’s administration is promising to punish achievement by taxing and regulating it more. If the evolutionary premise of rational optimism is accurate, there is no guarantee that America will necessarily be the place where it evolves. Optimism and innovation will grow where it is rewarded. That isn’t a matter of politics but of rational action.
As I discuss at my own blog http://www.optimismadvantage.com, people can become more optimistic and transform their attitude and actions into results. But many will be taking their innovation to countries who will reward it. Will America be America if we chase away the golden geese that have served it so well? I’d like to know what the author has to say about incentives and its role in the evolving prosperity he predicts.
By the way, I also agree that optimists will meet the challenges we face in the years to come. Why? Because they have done it before. They are realists who want to know the problems they face, so they can get busy solving them. The solutions won’t come out of politicians in Washington but to those who respond to challenge and incentives in the real world!
Funny, I always viewed serious specialization as the result of us settling down into a farming society, and as such producing much more food per person (so not everybody has to work on food production) and having a larger population overall (so there’s a market for the increased output that specialization gives). Do you think that specialization would’ve been inevitable if we continued to exist as hunter-gatherers, or do you view the move to farming societies as some sort of inevitable human step?