You don’t need to be a historian to know, 18th Century was pretty shitty. Engligh, Dutch, French were pillaging lands after lands taking away their wealth and storing it in their European Capitals.
This practice was called mercantilism.
Fastforward to today:- We are pretty fine:- The territories they once pillaged are now happily trading with them, India, SouthEast Asia and Singapore has become a hub, everyone knows the meteoric rise of China.
If you think deeply English, French, Dutch are also more well-off now.
What changed?
A guy named Adam Smith came.
You see, for a series of centuries humans have fought over land,money, status etc.
The results have been horrific. Incessant battles, famines, constant rivalry.
Mahatma Gandhi undestanding this said out aloud “There is enough for man’s need, but not enough for man’s greed”
For the greedy Britishers would not stop at India they want to sell opium to China too.
The only true way to create a world without this incessant battles was to kill the greed in humans.
For, if Britishers had no greed they wouldn’t have attacked.
But, what if this quote by Gandhi is wrong.
What if we create a world where there is enough for man’s greed.
You wonder how?
Okay lets understand this.
What is greed:- Wikipedia defines greed as “Greed is an uncontrolled longing for increase in the acquisition or use of material gain; or social value, such as status, or power.”
Longing for “increase” in acquisition of wealth, status, land
So by definition even if you have annexed India the greedy britishers would like to increase their power and get China too.
No matter how much you have you need more.
Now how to solve this?
Simple Stop thinking that there are finite resources think infinite resources.
Before you think what are infinite resources, lets go to definition of Infinite.
Infinity in maths is defined simply as Take the largest number possible; Add 1 to it. That is infinity.
Now combine this:- The only way you could have greedy people is by having infinite resources. No matter how much you have, you want more. Take the largest number add 1 to it.
Hmmm….now but how to create this mystical Infinite Resources?!
This is where our Adam comes in.
The answer is Capitalism.
Now, I know you must have heard a lot of bad things about my friend but hear me out.
Infinite Resources:- Now we all know land is finite, natural resources are finite hell even printed money is finite, the only thing which is infinite is human thoughts.
Hmm but how can you make human thoughts a resource?
Sounds tough but has been done…think about religion…what is it but a whole lotta people saying my God exists…..The only truth of that remains as long as all these people’s thoughts are focused that way. If we stop believing the game’s over.
Okay let’s dig deeper:- Through observing religion we have realized that if a lot of people assign something a value that starts to have great deal of value.
Now, so what if we enable people to put in value to things:- The values could be totally in their heads:- Apple Stocks are worth $2 Tn USD, Coinbase is worth $100 Bn USD, Kalam Labs is worth $50 Mn USD.
Now…now this must be sounding a bit bollocks how could people just keep assigning value to something.
No, they can’t:- The only way to get that value is if you could create something which someone wants. And if that someone believes they have got value from it, they’ll give you money. Using a bunch of that money you can make people believe that here is your value of thousand billion dollars.
Lets look at it from an Infinite Lens:- Make something which someone “wants”
And as our fellow Gandhiji said there is never enough for someone’s wants (pssst its infinite) so you could theoretically create infinite things and get infinite value for yourself.
Further, further there is another catch you want that other person to give you money for it. So if the person has a lot of money you would be happy! You would give the product (which makes him happy) and get the money which make you happy!
Now, this might be sounding a bit basic but lets go to our first thought the prosperous Europe and India.
How did this happen?
Because now for the first time:- Europeans don’t have to take away India’s wealth so as to be rich BECAUSE if they take away India’s wealth they might just get $1000 USD but if they create a world order where they could trade with $100 USD profit they could potentially create value in people’s heads of $1Mn USD.
You might be thinking I am reaching for the stars with my conclusions.
But, read once about Marshall Plan and you’ll find out.
So as to end wars a new economic system was introduced which ensures that one country trades so much with another country that its always better to trade rather than go to war.
You might think I could have just written the above two lines and ended the essay. But, remember that we are talking about greedy people here, and if you can’t give them infinite benefits to trade with each other they’ll just go to war as they had done so for tens of centuries.