a baseball is pitched from the mound. it takes several seconds to reach the batter. the batter swings and clocks the ball into the atmosphere. it takes more than a few seconds to arc up over the outfield. it was struck with such massive force that it flies over the stands, which takes more seconds. several seconds later, that hurtling ball crashes into a car’s windshield. more seconds later, the sound of the crash and the blaring car alarm travel back into the stadium and back to the fans who begin cheering. a second or so later, the sound finally reaches the pitcher and moments later the batter. home run!
although the game can be exciting, the story is also an allegory for the relationship between time, space and causality. how much time passed between the pitch — also known as the cause — and the broken windshield — the effect? 30 seconds? 40 seconds?
can you think of any more allegories, analogies or examples where the initial cause and the effect were distant in spacetime? surprisingly, every single interaction of every single bit of energy or matter in the universe can be an example, because causality is everywhere.
economies work in a similar fashion. causes and effects can be far flung from eachother. sometimes they are so far apart that our puny brains forget they can be related. for instance, supply chains can be so long that they take months, years and sometimes decades to complete. this is where our models of economics often fall short. we often don’t know, perhaps because businesses don’t always track or sometimes can’t know the entirety of their supply chains.
what’s happening in the world now is that the links in the supply chains are breaking down, but we won’t realize that for months or years because we have nearby stock of supplies which delude us into believing we have plenty. we are unknowingly eating into our supplies right now, but those supplies will begin to run low soon. the workers and managers who supply those chains have been furloughed or laid off or locked into their houses en masse just like you and your neighbors. once we run out of supplies for our supply chains, we will experience long droughts of resources — some of them basic resources.
this is unfortunately the blind spot that social media and news media and sometimes even modern governments have. they take for granted that the shelves have always been stocked. sadly, that’s the mass delusion imposed upon us by supply chain efficiency. but efficient systems are subject to droughts even more readily than inefficient systems. and where are the backups? are you ready to put on your gloves and your hat to go out and be an agriculturist? is there enough water? enough fertilizer? enough soil? enough land? enough ploughs?
the answer is no.
you’d better hope for your sake and your neighbor’s sake that this farce ends quickly. because when the food and water and electricity stop coming, and you live in the desert, i can guarantee that there are only enough resources for one of you — between yourself and your neighbor — and one of you will be stronger than the other.