To end global poverty, put Musk on Mars…
It is a topic of great debate if we must be investing money in space travel or defence systems when more than half of the population is still struggling to put food on the table.
And this argument is very justified until you look at the structure of society from a broader perspective. And that structure tends to have a pyramid shape.
Many other systems in nature like the food chain or even the shape of a mountain (or the massive tombs of ancient rulers of Egypt), these structures provide stability to themselves.
And this is simple to define too - the no. of elements at the bottom of the pyramid is far larger than the no. of elements on the top.
If you try to put all the elements horizontally, they are going to occupy a very large base. If you try to make it too tall, it will be crushed under its own weight. Too many elements on any one level of the structure is just unstable.
Enough of the geometry now, on to the philosophy behind this idea.
In our society people like Elon musk or Jeff Bezos tend to be high on the top of the pyramid (Apex). And the bottom layers are formed by the hunger ridden strata who is also battling various diseases, mostly in developing nations of Africa and the Indian subcontinent.
Even if there are development programs that lift them from a level 5 at the bottom of the pyramid, the level 4 is going to get too crowded and display the same kind of living conditions as previously seen on level 5.
This problem can have a simple solution; to move the entire pyramid up, including all of its layers.
And no matter how hard you push it from the below, the weight will be too much to give results. A better way to move it up will be to pull the pyramid up from the top.
Imagine this, in order to pull the pyramid from its top layer, we as humans will have to go ahead with a somewhat humongous task of getting Elon musk to mars. This will require improving our use of resources and level of technology to be able to support this effort.
It causes the bottom layers to work harder and consequently in a much more efficient way. Once the top spot of the pyramid is vacated, it can be filled in by the people at the next layer and then the next layer, and so on.
We will have created better technology in this process, upskilled more people to look after these efforts and freed up more of the resources than were hogged by the top premier class of people.
This way the benefits of the advancement of mankind will progressively trickle down to the poorest of the society. The level 5 might no longer be bothered by their worry of bread and bed every day, but maybe think about education and training or a choice of different medical facilities.
A crude fact remains that we will never be able to put the entire human race at the same level of development, but we can only try to improve the standards of living for everyone at once.
This is not perfect. But the before and after society pictures of this pyramid theory is somewhat similar to the comparison of a developing nation and a developed nation, respectively.
