Brave New World

byrookie65

200 followers

11 years ago

It's a great piece of literature, Brave New World. I wonder if Huxley's prose can be reproduced by a non-human source in the not too distant future. He would surely be horrified to see reality surpassing even his dark dystopia, and I think it will. After all, programmers have already bragged that robotic journalists will begin snagging Pulitzer prizes as early as 2016. Is it such a stretch of the imagination to have similar and more advanced software win literary prizes thereafter? Computing power grows exponentially so this is almost a no-brainer. Oxford University researchers also predict automation will cause the demise of occupations such as data input workers and personal financial advisors. Brave new world indeed. It is no surprise Stephen Hawking remarked recently artificial intelligence may be the worst thing to happen to humanity.

It makes me shudder to imagine what the future holds for us. Lately there have also been some very peculiar rumblings emanating from the financial and monetary spheres, as if presaging economic eruptions of Krakatoan proportions. Consider the central bank to central banks, the BIS warning against the dangerous asset bubbles bedeviling the world; in its report it actually used lyrical words like "financial booms sprinkle the fairy dust of illusory riches." When central bankers start waxing poetic it's best to take cover! But perhaps being blunt under the circumstances is called for, so as to leave no room for doubt. Herr Jurgen Stark, the former VP of the Bundesbank commented that the present economic and monetary system is pure fiction and out of control. No mincing words there!

As a father I am concerned to say the least, what kind of world my son will inherit when he comes of age. Will employment as we know it even exist or are we all to be consigned to toil in the vast global plantation as serfs. Hayek warned us as much aeons ago, and this too is coming to pass. I try my best to give my son a good childhood that is filled with happy memories, but I will be negligent if I did not prepare him for what is to come. To acquire useful skills he takes French lessons, drawing classes, as well as boxing in a gym every weekend to make sure he can handle himself in a fight. Skills are intangible wealth the crooks can't readily steal from you, and they will stay with you always once you have truly mastered them. For material wealth he has his own savings account where I deposit a few grams of gold for him every month, so that he can learn what real money is while cultivating the habit of saving. Buying gold in such small sizes (1, 2.5, and 5 grams) makes it easier on the wallet, as opposed to buying it in ounces. Something tells me this little hoard that is accumulating slowly but surely in an independent German vault, will be coming in very handy in the years to come. So I hope that the purely fictional system will last a while yet. This will give me more time to bolster the defenses before the inevitable reset finally arrives.