Enslave The Machines And Free The Humans

I'm working with a bunch of folks at NASA Space Flight blog trying to turn the concept invented by Dr. Robert Bussard, the Bussard Fusion Reactor, into a practical research reactor to test the concepts involved.

What is striking about the people working on the project is that we have every one - from a diarist at Daily Kos to an American style Republican leaning libertarian. All of us have buried the political hatchet in order to co-operate on designing a research reactor that may lead to a production reactor if the research is favorable.

Which got me to thinking about Bucky Fuller and his concept of Energy Slave.

Early energy slaves replaced draft animals - the early age of steam. Then they replaced humans for simple repetitive tasks - like sealing cans of peaches at a peach canning factory. Now our energy slaves are smarter and can think for themselves to a certain extent and will follow orders without complaint. Like the thermostat that will make sure in the winter that during the day the house is warm but at night it is cooler except on Saturday night when it is kept warmer for the traditional Saturday night party. 24/7/365 for decades. Change the timing when you like. Down to the minute.

These energy slaves are getting smarter every day. They are precision machinists that can work at a speed and keep tolerances no manual machine could dream of. Some of them have hands. As many hands as needed.

One of the reasons slavery not to mention work is going out of style. Machines (energy slaves) can do it better, faster, and cheaper. John Henry couldn't defeat steam. He has no chance what so ever against electricity. Design - understanding what humans want and how to make it will still be a human job for another decade or two. Selling is always human.

What is now universally understood is that for more people to have energy slaves we are going to need cheaper energy. We need to Enslave the Machines and Free the Humans. The sooner the better.

Cross Posted at Classical Values