Thoughts for November 27, 2022
Good afternoon. This week’s topics are extraterrestrialization, colony collapse disorder, the Nuclear Posture Review, and missile defense.
Extraterrestrialization
Extraterrestrialization, as I am using the term here, is the transition of the human economy and society into one based on off-world activities. It is a broad and somewhat vague definition by design, as how, or even whether, the process will unfold is hard to predict. Nevertheless, I will offer some speculations as to what extraterrestrialization might look like, if it unfolds at all.
One of the central macrotrends in human history is economic integration. This entails urbanization, larger political structures (city states → kingdoms → empires → internationalization), specialization, and trade. See, for instance, Morgan Kelly’s analysis of the dynamics of this kind of Smithian growth, named for Adam Smith and his analysis of the specialization behind a pin factory.
Economic integration continues to this day, and it is driven even by technologies that some advocates hope will reverse integration. Consider the many such ideas that are heard today or were heard in the recent past: 3D printing will decentralize manufacturing away from large-scale production and trade; vertical farming will decentralize agriculture away from agribusiness; renewable energy will decentralize energy away from fossil fuel companies and utilities; and so forth. Numerous illustrations of why these ideas tend not to work could be cited; this paper is a good one. It finds that as hearing aid production shifted to 3D printing, trade in hearing aids increased, rather than decreased, as a result. The authors find similar effects in other (partially) 3D printed products.
Political efforts to reverse economic integration have also not proven viable. Autarky, or economic nationalism, is a theory that a country should be self-sufficient in the production of critical goods. It was tried unsuccessfully by the Nazis and has failed before and since. Bioregionalism is another kind of localism, presented in ecological language, that seeks to divide the world into culturally and ecologically defined bioregions and limit trade between them. Bioregionalism too is unworkable.
Nevertheless, a romantic vision of space migration persists, that colonists will be able to establish independent societies, and that they will have a high level or even full autonomy. Such an outcome would work against longstanding historical trends, is rooted in ideologies that have already been tried and failed, and are thus highly implausible. It is especially implausible in the case of a space colony because such a colony will be highly dependent on manufactured goods, such as semiconductors, which require complex supply chains that cannot be replicated in an extraterrestrial environment without a high degree of specialized labor, implying a population in the hundreds of thousands at least.
I doubt that there will ever be an extraterrestrial society that is independent of the larger human economy, except perhaps in the very distant future with seemingly magic tools such as molecular assemblers, artificial general intelligence, and interstellar travel. Until then, I suspect that a more realistic scenario will look something like this.
Declining launch costs bring into economic feasibility orbital industries such as space tourism and microgravity manufacturing. It will be sensible for some people working in these industries to live in orbit, rather than travel back and forth. However, these people will still require regular resupplies from Earth. This creates a source of demand for space travel, which creates an economic justification for lower-cost, higher-capital methods of launch, such as microwave thermal propulsion. Lower launch costs, in turn, lead to an expansion of orbital industry and the development of industries to service orbital industry, such as the refining of lunar ice into rocket fuel. This will lead to even cheaper but more capital intensive forms of space launch, such as the Lofstrom loop.
For all the disadvantages associated with off-world living, there are a few crucial advantages which, in time, I expect to become the dominant factors. First, the limits on the availability of natural resources, and the environment’s capacity to absorb the impacts of industry, are many thousands of times greater throughout the solar system than they are on Earth. Second, travel will be far cheaper and easier between orbital colonies than into or out of a gravity well. Meanwhile, the challenges of off-world living, such as artificial gravity, radiation exposure, and circadian rhythm, will be mitigated. The extraterrestrialization event is the time at which the advantages of orbital living outweigh the disadvantages, and the metaphorical center of gravity of the economy shifts from a global economy to a cislunar economy, and then eventually to a solar economy.
Colony Collapse Disorder
Colony collapse disorder (CCD) is the phenomenon of most worker bees disappearing from a colony. Many dieoffs of bee colonies are well-explained and are distinct from CCD. The cause of CCD remains unclear, and it likely results from a combination of factors. One factor in particular of concern is a class of pesticides known as neonicotinoids. It is well-established that these pesticides cause neurological damage to pollinators. What is less well-established, but suspected, is that these pesticides are sufficiently harmful to pollinators at environmentally relevant concentrations to be a major contributor to CCD. This study by Carreck and Ratnieks doubts that this is the case. It is also not entirely clear if neonicotinoids cause net harm to bee colonies; the harm associated with the pesticides themselves might be less than the benefits of more crops to pollinate.
This study finds a winter mortality for bee colonies to be 29.6% from 2007-2014, compared to a 14% pre-CCD baseline. Nevertheless, the increased mortality has not resulted in there being fewer bee colonies, as beekeepers can make up the difference through increased breeding.
The same study finds that the economic cost of CCD is $120 million per year from increased pollination costs for West Coast almond growers, whereas an economic cost associated with other crops has not been found. An earlier estimate is that the cost would be $8-12 billion on the American agricultural economy. I haven’t yet found good quantification of the impacts on wild pollinators, though it is well established that throughout most of the world, insect populations are on the decline. Still, one cannot help but notice the gulf between actual impacts of CCD and sensationalist reports in the press.
Uncertainty has not been a barrier to regulation. The EU restrictions on neonicotinoids is based on the precautionary principle, the idea that, given scientific uncertainty, regulation should err on the side of a more restrictive approach. While there is some merit to such an approach, as I have argued in other contexts, the precautionary principle needs to be bounded. First, few decisions present truly risk-free options. In the case of banning classes of pesticides, the risk is of higher food prices and greater land conversion to agriculture as a result of lower yields, outcomes that might cause more damage than the ban will prevent. Second, the precautionary principle creates perverse incentives. Organizations with a pecuniary or ideological interest in policy often exaggerate risks in order to coerce a society to adopt a favored policy. Worse, since these organizations use uncertainty to their advantage, they have an incentive to oppose research that would resolve uncertainty, such as some environmentalists have done with solar radiation management research (though not all environmental outfits are in opposition).
Nuclear Posture Review
Last month, the Defense Department released its National Defense Strategy, including the Nuclear Posture Review and Missile Defense Review. Every presidential administration releases an NDS; this one is quite late, and rumor has it that the delay is connected to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The document is useful as a high level overview of what the administration thinks about defense.
On the Nuclear Posture Review in particular, defense analysts were particularly looking for its stance on No First Use and Sole Purpose policies. No First Use is what it sounds like: a declaration that the United States would, under no circumstances, be the first country to use nuclear weapons in combat. Before taking office, Joe Biden proposed Sole Purpose as a declaratory policy.
the sole purpose of our nuclear arsenal is to deter—and, if necessary, retaliate for—a nuclear attack against the United States and its allies.
Neither declaratory policy was adopted; it seems likely to me that Russia’s behavior this year dissuaded Biden from such a dovish stance. War on the Rocks has an explanation of the issues around declaratory policy. It should be noted that such policies are not necessarily binding; the existence of a No First Use policy would not prevent the president from deciding to use nuclear weapons first in a crisis, nor would the absence of such a policy require the use of nuclear weapons in any particular scenario. China and India are the only nuclear powers today with No First Use policies, though India’s policy makes exceptions for chemical and biological attacks. The credibility of China’s pledge is in dispute.
There are reasons not to adopt a No First Use policy. Current policy leaves “strategic ambiguity” that strengthens the weapons’ deterrence value. It is also a valuable reassurance to allies. No First Use could contribute to proliferation if it convinces, say, South Korea or Japan that American support is shaky and that they need to defend themselves with their own nuclear weapons.
The NPR does include the following bit of bureaucracy-speak:
Adopt an integrated deterrence approach that works to leverage nuclear and non-nuclear capabilities to tailor deterrence under specific circumstances.
I interpret this as, in lieu of any change to declaratory policy, a signal toward a less aggressive nuclear posture than was envisioned in the 2018 NPR. Perhaps also, Russia’s poor military performance this year has helped America’s and NATO’s confidence in conventional superiority.
The more dovish, pro-arms control Federation of American Scientists found more to be happy about with the cancellation of the nuclear sea-launched cruise missile and the B83-1 megaton gravity bomb. The NPR’s focus is on modernization rather than force size.
It is an interesting question of what the size and composition of nuclear forces should be. Fred Kaplan asks that question here, and though the question is good, answers are not forthcoming. He ends the article thusly:
We would be better off mounting a full rebuttal of the vague assertions about “perceptions” (no one argues that some wasteful anti-poverty program should be funded anyway, so that it looks like we’re fighting poverty). It’s time for a return to first principles, the basic questions that nobody has been asking: How much is enough? And enough to do what? Enough material has been declassified over the last few decades that informed citizens can hold hearings and stage debates, even if members of Congress won’t. At long last, let the hearings and debates begin.
Unfortunately, the article ends on that note, without Kaplan actually attempting to estimate numbers. The thrust of article is that the American nuclear force is larger than it needs to be, but he crafts his argument though insinuation, leaving the reader unconvinced.
There are a couple of important principles about nuclear weapons that should be kept in mind. First, there are broadly speaking three approaches to defending against foreign nuclear threats: deterrence, ballistic missile defense, and arms control. All three approaches are important, and they work in a complementary fashion. Some arms control advocates oppose deterrence and missile defense because they want arms control instead, but opposing two planks undermines the third.
Second, the NPR correctly identifies the importance of leadership from the United States and other nuclear powers. Desirable though it may be, there is at the time no plausible pathway to a world free of nuclear weapons.
As long as nuclear weapons exist, the United States and other nuclear weapon states have a special charge to be responsible custodians of these nuclear capabilities and work with a sense of urgency to create a security environment that would ultimately allow for their elimination. Nuclear weapons have not been employed in more than 75 years. While ensuring our security, our goal is to extend this record of non-use and reduce the risk of a nuclear war that could have catastrophic effects for the United States and the world.
Ballistic Missile Defense
Since I’ve discussed missile defense at length several times already, here I want to quickly highlight a few resources. As noted above, the Missile Defense Review was also part of the National Defense Strategy, making the subject timely again.
The Congressional Research Service recently published a quick overview of U.S. missile defense, which I recommend for a fast introduction. The document covers the distinction between short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs), medium-range ballistic missiles (MRBMs), and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). It reviews the major missile threats against the United States. It covers the four major components of U.S. missile defense: the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense (GMD), Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD), Aegis, and Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3). It also reviews some major areas of international cooperations.
The survivability of expensive carriers, which are central to American naval power, in the face of UAS (drone) or missile threats is of great concern, especially in the event of a conflict with China over Taiwan. Popular Mechanics has an article, "The Navy’s New $13 Billion Aircraft Carrier [Gerald R. Ford class] Is Already Obsolete. This Weapon [directed energy] Can Save It." which is a very good overview of the promise of directed energy for ballistic missile defense. Unfortunately I don’t have a link to the article, since it is subscriber only content.
There are too many important points raised in the article about the advantage of directed energy to fully enumerate them, but one especially important concept is on cost ratio. For conventional missile defense means, an attack on a carrier might be advantageous for the attacker even if it fails, since the defender is forced to spend more on munitions than the attacker used. With directed energy, though, once the equipment is installed, each shot is very cheap. The CRS has more depth on the Navy’s efforts to defend their ships with lasers.
Last week I highlighted an article that called for a shift of defense spending away from research and toward capacity-building. While this might be sensible as a general principle, there are a few especially critical areas of defense R&D. Missile defense, and in particular directed energy, is arguably at the top of the list. The Navy is going all in, having canceled the railgun program last year because of the evident advantage of directed energy.