The Incisal Edge

Recent research supports the conclusions of a controversial environmental study released 40 years ago: The world is on track for disaster. So says Australian physicist Graham Turner, who revisited perhaps the most ground breaking academic work of the 1970s,The Limits to Growth.

Written by MIT researchers for an international think tank, the Club of Rome, the study used computers to model several possible future scenarios. The business-as-usual scenario estimated that if human beings continued to consume more than nature was capable of providing, global economic collapse and precipitous population decline could occur by 2030.

However, the study also noted that unlimited economic growth was possible, if governments forged policies and invested in technologies to regulate the expansion of humanity’s ecological footprint. Prominent economists disagreed with the report’s methodology and conclusions. Yale’s Henry Wallich opposed active intervention, declaring that limiting economic growth too soon would be “consigning billions to permanent poverty.”

Turner compared real-world data from 1970 to 2000 with the business-as-usual scenario. He found the predictions nearly matched the facts. “There is a very clear warning bell being rung here,” he says. “We are not on a sustainable trajectory.”

Original story in Smithonian.com here.

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From Seth Godin – who is correct as usual.

The end of the diva paradox

Great surgeons don’t need to be respectful or have a talented, kind or alert front desk staff. They’re great at the surgery part, and you’re not here for the service, you’re here to get well (if you believe that the surgery part is what matters). In fact, gruffness might be a clue to their skill for some.

Great opera singers don’t have to be reasonable or kind. They sing like no one else, that’s why you hired them, and why they get to (are expected to) act like divas. Get over it.

So the thinking goes.

The traditional scarcity model implied some sort of inverse relationship between service and quality. Not for service businesses like hotels, of course, but for the other stuff. If someone was truly gifted, of course they didn’t have the time or focus to also be kind or reasonable or good at understanding your needs. A diva was great partly because, we decided, she was a jerk.

I think that’s changing, possibly forever, for a bunch of reasons:

• The state of the art is now easier to find. Word spreads about behavior and service faster than ever. As a result, customers quickly become aware of what a raw deal they’re getting from this supposedly gifted individual.
• It’s so much easier to deliver better service (Dr. Diva, please send me an email if you’re running late!) that we’re far less forgiving.
• Since just about any intelligent and caring person can use technology and a bit of humility to deliver better service (see above), we start to wonder whether that diva provider actually is intelligent and caring. And if he isn’t, it doesn’t really matter if he has some sort of skill, because uncaring hands are worth avoiding.
• With fewer great gigs available (even in opera), it’s not so easy act like a jerk (or be insulated and uncaring) and still get work.

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