- Author
- Debbie Chachra, professor of engineering at Olin College of Engineering
- Published
- 5 August 2021
- Kind
- Magazine essay, mixing personal observation with philosophy
- Original
- comment.org/care-at-scale/
- Subject
- Society and technology
- Themes
- Who holds the power
What it is
An essay by an engineering professor in Comment, a magazine of public theology. Its subtitle is "Bodies, agency, and infrastructure". It argues that infrastructure extends what bodies can do and binds people together.
What it says
- Chachra says infrastructure is a general-purpose means of freeing up time, energy and attention.
- Chachra says money is individual while infrastructure is collective. Chachra uses Paul Graham Raven's phrase "collective cyborgs".
- Chachra says nobody chooses their birth, so everyone has passed through Rawls's veil of ignorance.
- Chachra says energy systems localize benefits and distribute harms, with fossil fuels the largest case.
- Chachra says climate change is ending predictability. Except in the shortest terms, systems will be maintained equitably or not at all.
- Chachra calls for infrastructural citizenship, a duty to look after each other in perpetuity.
What evidence it gives
The essay rests on the author's site visits and family history in Canada and India. It also cites thinkers. It gives a few facts, such as night-light images of Korea. It reports no study of its own.
Interests and limits
Comment describes itself as public theology for the common good. The essay is a moral argument and sets out no costs or plans. It was published in 2021. Its climate claims are stated in general terms.
Connections
These links are this wiki's own reading, not claims the sources make.
- The Collective Ambition Behind Odysseus, a Game-changing Sci-fi Larp. Chachra treats infrastructure as a system of collective care. Odysseus shows this at small scale, with over two hundred volunteers running a spaceship. One organizer spent about 2000 hours and will not repeat it as a volunteer. So it also shows what care costs its carers.