Poverty is ‘sustainable,’ prosperity is progressive.
“Sustainability” is not a good way to think about things. “‘Sustainability’ implies that our goal should be repetition: that we want to do something that can be repeated over and over and over.
“But I think of life in terms of evolution or progress. We don’t want to do the same thing over and over and over, we want to find better and better ways of doing things…
If people are free, and they are free to use energy and to use technology, they can have really good lives even in places with naturally inhospitable climates.
“Is it sustainable [for a society] to live in poverty for 10,000 years? Well, yeah, that’s sustainable, but it’s not progressive. So I want to be progressive, not sustainable.”
Alex Epstein, from his post ‘Poverty is ‘sustainable,’ prosperity is progressive‘
Hat tip: Not PC
Today’s wisdom was brought to you by the Whale Meat Company and the Steak & Bacon box
