Welcome to Engineering Generosity!
We need to start focusing on building abundant systems. With the rise of AI, it will be even more important. We’ve already started down the path of scaling scarcity in dangerous ways. There is a bright future ahead, if we allow ourselves to build it.
It’s not currently the one we are heading towards.
Instead, we are heading toward a future in which everyone is focused on maximizing their own outcomes. Not only is that not sustainable, it’s not even the most effective or efficient way to proceed!
I’m going to show you how we can create systems that allow people to have the space they need in order to not only survive, but also thrive.
This Substack will be the starting point for my first book, which currently has the working title of “Engineering Generosity: Why we need to build abundant systems in the age of AI”. I’ve always been a proponent of building in public, so now I’m going to be writing my book in public. And like my building, I’m going to be sharing all the details along the way.
I’m also going to be doing abundant systems coaching and consulting. Right now, educational systems, companies, and governments are focused on the wrong things. They are trying to reduce complex systems down to measurable metrics, and they are destroying the things they are trying to improve.
Here’s an introduction to abundant systems if you are curious:
My thesis is that people are the most undervalued asset in today’s economy, and I’m going to prove it. I’ve created a venture studio where I’m investing my time, energy, and resources into people. People who don’t have others paying attention to them. People who have struggled in a number of different ways. And people who could do great things for the world if they are only given the chance.
This venture studio is the experiment that I’m setting up to prove out my ideas around quantum economics and how we design systems around the value of information. We’ve created scarce systems based on concepts that don’t fit reality, and that makes these systems have all sorts of negative downstream effects.
For more info on the experiment, go here.
We live in an abundant society, but we’ve got everyone focused on their own future and hedging their bets to make sure they don’t get left behind in a rapidly changing world. Instead, I believe we need to work together to make sure that nobody gets left behind and everybody can go confidently into the future we all believe is possible, but don’t see coming.
I’ve seen the damage that our social and economic systems do to people. I’ve seen people who just want to make the world a better place, but can’t afford to feed their kids. They are locked out of a society that insists they need to work, but don’t offer them the opportunities to do so. They have immense talents, but we’ve created systems that screen them out before they have a chance to start. I see what happens to our mental health when that happens.
All in the name of “speed” and “progress”. In reality, it looks fast now, but in the overall timeline of human history, is slowing us down immensely. It’s time to truly accelerate human flourishing.
I’ve seen the e/acc movement (effective accelerationism) in tech, and I’ve co-opted it a bit and transformed it into something a bit more useful: econ/acc. Economic acceleration. We need to accelerate the economic growth of the bottom so that we don’t fracture society by having the economy grow at two different speeds.
Have you ever wondered how the economic indicators all look great, but people complain about the economy all the time? That’s why. There are two economies in play: a linear growth economy based on human timelines and an exponential growth economy based on digital timelines. We’ve over-valued data in a human economy, and that has led to all sorts of really bad things happening. It’s time to align the two economies into a human-centric, abundant economy.
Unfortunately, I can’t do it alone. I’d love to be able to, and frankly, I’ve been trying that for way too long. So it’s time to change that, and find the others. I know there are others out there who want to change the world we live in, to make the future a brighter and more exciting place for everyone.
So I’m inviting those people to join me in this mission. Together, we can bring about the change we need.
As part of that, I’m going to be setting up a community of paid subscribers around this Substack. All posts will be free, but the community will be paid, so that I can pay my bills and help others pay theirs. If I’m able to find the right investors for the venture studio, that might change in the future. There will also be options soon to preorder the book and maybe some other interesting experiments to demonstrate the power of abundant systems.
But I’m also not going to block anyone from joining who can’t afford it. If you want to join, but don’t want to pay, just reply and let me know. You don’t have to tell me why, you don’t have to share anything you don’t want to. No questions asked.
In terms of the coaching and consulting, it will be similar. I understand that the systems we are in don’t always make sense, so my prices will be based on what you can afford. If you want my help building out better systems, or coaching to help you learn to live more generously and abundantly, my prices are what you can comfortably afford.
I know what my time is “worth” as a software engineer with a lot of experience in building AI systems. But I also know that I can’t do the employment path anymore. Companies aren’t structured to be abundant systems. Instead, they are built to outlast the people that do the work within them. They extract everything they can from the people who are part of them, and then replace them with the next person up.
So if I can help you or your business or your government start thinking abundantly, please reach out and let me know. I’d be happy to help.
If that still hasn’t convinced you that it’s worth subscribing, that's cool! I’m probably not a good fit for you. But I do appreciate you reading this far!
