We are all wasters
I recently stumbled across a peculiar analogy between the science of heat and energy--so called thermodynamics--and the socio-economic basis of society: an analogy whose implication, I'm afraid, is not very flattering for modern society.
One of the first proponents of the importance of the idea of 'work' in physical science was William Whewell, in his book 'The mechanics of engineering', published in 1841. In modern parlance, 'work' equals force x distance: the 'work done' in moving an object, for instance, is the force required multiplied by the distance moved. Work measures the energy required to make something happen, essentially.
It's difficult to realise nowadays that this was a big idea in the 19th century. Scientists still had not grasped the basics of energy, temperature, heat, and efficiency--despite that the industrial revolution, relying absolutely on the science of these things, was already in full swing.
Whewell's book actually uses not 'work' but the term 'labouring force'. This is a nice clue to one of Whewell's other preoccupations (shared no doubt with many a concerned participant in the industrial revolution): labour not as an abstract scientific concept, but as that stuff done by people.
Whewell distinguished between what he called 'productive labour' and 'unproductive labour'. In society, productive labour was that which went to actually producing something. Unproductive labour was that which went to serving someone--nothing concrete was actually produced, the labour involved (by your butler, your maid, your cook, your footman, your gardener, your groom...) simply dissipated into thin air.
In engineering terms, Whewell was making a distinction of vital importance to industry (and later to the science of energy, heat and work): the distinction between useful and 'wasted' effort. 'Productive labour' was energy that did something useful; 'unproductive labour' was waste heat.
The efficiency of a machine depended on the ratio of useful to wasted power. Central to the science of thermodynamics (as the smorgasbord of heat-temperature-energy-entropy science eventually came to be called) was this same distinction between directed and dissipated energy.
The socio-economic roots of Whewell's terminology imply, then, an interesting and rather depressing conclusion. In the 19th century (and much of the 20th) Britain's economy was undoubtedly of a productive bent: masses of iron, steel, chemicals, textiles. Since the 3rd of May 1979 (T-day, if you will) we have of course been busily converting to the 'service economy': exchanging iron, steel and cloth for call-centres, consultancies, and those nowadays-ubiquitous people offering to wash your car for a fiver. (Whatever happened to the kids pocket-money economy?)
According to Whewell's productive and unproductive labour forces and the analogy with useful and wasted energy, then, our modern service economy is, basically, an almost entirely wasteful machine.
And we are all... well, wasters.
Oh dear.
One of the first proponents of the importance of the idea of 'work' in physical science was William Whewell, in his book 'The mechanics of engineering', published in 1841. In modern parlance, 'work' equals force x distance: the 'work done' in moving an object, for instance, is the force required multiplied by the distance moved. Work measures the energy required to make something happen, essentially.
It's difficult to realise nowadays that this was a big idea in the 19th century. Scientists still had not grasped the basics of energy, temperature, heat, and efficiency--despite that the industrial revolution, relying absolutely on the science of these things, was already in full swing.
Whewell's book actually uses not 'work' but the term 'labouring force'. This is a nice clue to one of Whewell's other preoccupations (shared no doubt with many a concerned participant in the industrial revolution): labour not as an abstract scientific concept, but as that stuff done by people.
Whewell distinguished between what he called 'productive labour' and 'unproductive labour'. In society, productive labour was that which went to actually producing something. Unproductive labour was that which went to serving someone--nothing concrete was actually produced, the labour involved (by your butler, your maid, your cook, your footman, your gardener, your groom...) simply dissipated into thin air.
In engineering terms, Whewell was making a distinction of vital importance to industry (and later to the science of energy, heat and work): the distinction between useful and 'wasted' effort. 'Productive labour' was energy that did something useful; 'unproductive labour' was waste heat.
The efficiency of a machine depended on the ratio of useful to wasted power. Central to the science of thermodynamics (as the smorgasbord of heat-temperature-energy-entropy science eventually came to be called) was this same distinction between directed and dissipated energy.
The socio-economic roots of Whewell's terminology imply, then, an interesting and rather depressing conclusion. In the 19th century (and much of the 20th) Britain's economy was undoubtedly of a productive bent: masses of iron, steel, chemicals, textiles. Since the 3rd of May 1979 (T-day, if you will) we have of course been busily converting to the 'service economy': exchanging iron, steel and cloth for call-centres, consultancies, and those nowadays-ubiquitous people offering to wash your car for a fiver. (Whatever happened to the kids pocket-money economy?)
According to Whewell's productive and unproductive labour forces and the analogy with useful and wasted energy, then, our modern service economy is, basically, an almost entirely wasteful machine.
And we are all... well, wasters.
Oh dear.
posted by mark haw at 3:10 pm
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