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Author Topic: The 1 percent per day superpower  (Read 23880 times)

Graknorke

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #225 on: February 15, 2015, 10:11:10 pm »

You know, increasing HDI could just decrease the standards of HDI... that's the problem with using metrics like that instead of something physical to change.
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FearfulJesuit

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #226 on: February 15, 2015, 10:20:11 pm »

You know, increasing HDI could just decrease the standards of HDI... that's the problem with using metrics like that instead of something physical to change.

Doubtful. The beauty and fallibility of HDI both lie in its simplicity. It's just a composite measure of three numbers: average life expectancy, GDP per capita, and years spent in school. The first is impossible to fake, the second is difficult to fake if you use a benchmark currency to measure GDP (this is susceptible to stuff like exchange rates that have more to do with economic (mis)management than quality of life, but it's still a useful way to compare economic development), and the third is...well, honestly not the most cut-and-dried metric, but it still tells you something, since every kid in school is a kid who's not working in a factory, even if the schools aren't very good.

There are downsides to this! HDI tells you nothing about gender equality, corruption, political instability, freedom of expression, or all sorts of other important things. These influence HDI indirectly, but not absolutely, and it's definitely possible for a highly developed country to be a totalitarian hermit state (Cuba), ridiculously corrupt (Argentina, southern Italy), or disgustingly misogynistic (Saudi Arabia). But that's kind of the point- those are more abstract and difficult to measure. HDI is simplistic, but it uses a standard that can be applied everywhere.

There might be even quicker and less disruptive ways to develop the world en masse. If you think of world GDP as a function over time, then the total amount of assets in the world is the integral of that function. XKCD informs us that the estimated total value of humanity's liquid assets was about $77 trillion- and that was in 2011; let's say it's about $85 trillion or so at the current moment.

Increasing the size of the world's liquid assets by 1% would give you a check for about $850 billion dollars a day, which would buy you pretty much any public works project you needed. If it were distributed evenly, it would be about a $120 check for every person on the planet today. Hello, basic income. (You can always use your powers to keep a lid on inflation if you need to. I'm not an economist and have no idea how much inflation this would cause.)

I'm starting to think this would make a good movie. Being able to magic up $850 billion a day gives you wealth on a scale that makes John D. Rockefeller look like a Bangladeshi street child, and with godlike wealth comes unbelievable power. There'd have to be some catch, though. Maybe the protagonist forgets about inflation and turns the world into Weimar Germany by accident?
« Last Edit: February 15, 2015, 10:57:06 pm by FearfulJesuit »
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Cryxis, Prince of Doom

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #227 on: February 16, 2015, 12:00:53 am »

Wouldn't decreasing the amount of CO2 just thin the atmosphere and cause more harm that good? And eventualy kill plant life from levels being too low and then over oxygenate the whole place?
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FearfulJesuit

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #228 on: February 16, 2015, 12:03:02 am »

Wouldn't decreasing the amount of CO2 just thin the atmosphere and cause more harm that good? And eventualy kill plant life from levels being too low and then over oxygenate the whole place?

No. CO2 is an extremely potent greenhouse gas, but it doesn't take up very much of the atmosphere- less than 1%. We only need to get it back to preindustrial levels, and as far as thinning the amount of gas in the atmosphere, it would probably be the equivalent of walking up a small hill, if that.
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Cryxis, Prince of Doom

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #229 on: February 16, 2015, 12:06:16 am »

Doesn't answer the second bit
With no CO2 or just very little won't a lot of plant life die off? Then when plants die we die because there is nothing to tear the carbon off the oxygen for us to use it again
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FearfulJesuit

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #230 on: February 16, 2015, 12:07:14 am »

Doesn't answer the second bit
With no CO2 or just very little won't a lot of plant life die off? Then when plants die we die because there is nothing to tear the carbon off the oxygen for us to use it again

We're not getting rid of all the CO2 in the atmosphere. We're just resetting it back to 280 ppm or so, which is the level it was at before the Industrial Revolution.

Plants will be fine. Every single plant on the planet today evolved to live in an atmosphere with 280 ppm of CO2.
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@Footjob, you can microwave most grains I've tried pretty easily through the microwave, even if they aren't packaged for it.

Cryxis, Prince of Doom

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #231 on: February 16, 2015, 12:10:37 am »

Ok
What eill you switch the 1% to after that?
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FearfulJesuit

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #232 on: February 16, 2015, 12:15:57 am »

Ok
What eill you switch the 1% to after that?

That's the question! I've outlined a method by which the owner of this power could, within six months, eliminate humanity's most pressing problems, make the entire world as stable and prosperous as Canada or Sweden, and spend eternity living on the fortunes of a hundred Croesoi. What do you do then?
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@Footjob, you can microwave most grains I've tried pretty easily through the microwave, even if they aren't packaged for it.

Cryxis, Prince of Doom

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #233 on: February 16, 2015, 09:12:25 am »

Increase awesome
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Blargityblarg

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #234 on: February 16, 2015, 10:26:50 am »

Decrease rules lawyering regarding percentage-based superpowers by 1%.
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Graknorke

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #235 on: February 16, 2015, 11:36:31 am »

-snip-
I somehow very much doubt that average life expectancy (units?), GDP per capita, AND years spent in education could ever sum up to a number less than 1, anywhere.
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Arx

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #236 on: February 16, 2015, 11:41:07 am »

That's why it's a measure, not a sum.
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Culise

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #237 on: February 16, 2015, 11:45:31 am »

But it is worth noting that it has already been redefined fairly recently for official reports compiled from 2010 on (GDP measures were recalibrated, and the education index redefined from a measure of literacy and enrollment to instead measure years of schooling); annual "redefinitions" that result in a net 1% change would not be beyond the realm of possibility. 
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Cryxis, Prince of Doom

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #238 on: February 16, 2015, 12:37:04 pm »

Increase amount of barrels filled with oil on earth's surface by 1%
Let the oceanic scavenger hunts begin
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Helgoland

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Re: The 1 percent per day superpower
« Reply #239 on: February 16, 2015, 06:49:12 pm »

Croesoi
Finally another friend of the creative pluralization!

Decrease number of humans that are not me by 1%. It may be gruesome, but it would be a fairly straightforward way of solving most environmental issues.
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