Key insights from my "From Poverty to Progress" book

Now you can cheat on the test!

Though I spend most of my time writing and reading books, I am a big fan of presenting content in an easily digestible way so people can get the key ideas without spending hours reading. In my first book, From Poverty to Progress: Understanding Humanity’s Greatest Achievement, I decided to add “Key Insights” callouts in the main flow of text of the paperback and hardcover versions. Unfortunately, they do not work well in the e-book and audiobook, so they are not included in that format.

I think that these “Key Insights” callouts are particularly helpful for students and teachers who use my book in the classroom. Teachers can use these insights to customize lecture notes and study aids that they think are appropriate for their age group.

I decided to publish these “Key Insights” callouts here so everyone can benefit. The insights are listed in the same order as discussed in my book.

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Below are excerpts from my book From Poverty to Progress: Understanding Humanity’s Greatest Achievement. You can purchase discounted copies of my book at my website, or pay full prize at Amazon.

See this example of “Key Insights” section (on the right) in printed books below:

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Below are all the “Key Insights” for the entire book. Each heading is a separate chapter in the book.

Measuring Progress

Striking progress has occurred over the last few generations.

That progress has touched virtually every nation on the planet.

The broad-based improvement in so many metrics cannot possibly be explained away by increased inequality.

Progress has translated into greater levels of self-reported happiness.

There is no indication that progress is slowing down.

Dramatic levels of progress can take place within one generation.

A world where virtually every nation has levels of standard of living similar to the Wealthy 12 today is achievable.

The Five Keys to Progress

The Five Keys to Progress are the necessary preconditions for a society to change from a state of poverty to a state of progress.

Progress does not come from government, politics, or policies.

Progress is an evolutionary process that comes from millions of small-scale decisions made by individuals who were trying to solve short-term local problems.

Each of the Five Keys to Progress is necessary for a society to transition from a state of poverty to a state of progress, but none are sufficient by themselves.

Once a society acquires the Five Keys to Progress, that society can transform itself into a vast, decentralized problem-solving network.

The degree to which peoples have enjoyed progress in history (and to a certain extent today) is largely determined by long-term historical factors that go back centuries or even millennia.

Key #1: A highly efficient food production and distribution system.

Food has been the critical constraint on innovation and progress throughout the vast bulk of human history.

For the overwhelming majority of our ancestors, the quest to acquire enough food to survive took up the majority of their waking hours.

Before one can innovate, one must first survive. In order to survive, one must eat large amounts of food.

Humans dispersed to survive, but this dispersal undermined their ability to innovate and copy the innovations of others.

Food production is highly constrained by geography.

The entire society had to be sculpted around the type of food that could be produced in the region.

Geographical differences still account for a significant proportion of the inequality between societies that exist to this day.

While other agricultural systems hardly changed for thousands of years, Northwest Europe has undergone many transformations. Each of these transformations resulted in a significantly increased food surplus per family of farmers.

Productive agriculture made trade-based cities possible.

Trade-based cities gave local farmers incentive to specialize and increase production.

Early industry was based upon products from farms.

Key #2: Trade-based cities packed with a large number of free citizens possessing a wide variety of skills. These people innovate new technologies, skills and social organizations and copy the innovations made by others.

Virtually all innovation happens in cities.

Humans living in close proximity can cooperate, specialize, learn new skills, copy ideas, test those ideas and constantly improve them based on feedback from other humans.

Until recently, less than 3% of people lived in cities.

Key #3: Decentralized political, economic, religious and ideological power. It is of particular importance that elites are forced into transparent, non-violent competition that undermines their ability to forcibly extract wealth from the masses.

Unfortunately, throughout most of human history, the bulk of the food surplus has been extracted by political, economic or religious elites in the form of taxes and land rents.

When elites are forced to compete against each other non-violently, they must offer something to others to win that competition.

Rather than conquering new lands or squeezing taxes from the peasantry, modern elites become wealthy by creating wealth. They do so by innovating new technologies, skills and social organizations. The innovators gain vast wealth from those innovations, but the masses as a whole receive far more of the benefits.

Key #4: At least one high-value-added industry that exports to the rest of the world. This injects wealth into the city or region, accelerates economic growth and creates markets for smaller local industries and services.

To successfully export, a city needs the necessary technology, skills, organizations and capital. These factors are typically acquired by copying them from richer regions that already have them, modifying them for the local environment and then slowly learning by doing.

Key #5: Widespread use of fossil fuels.

Today, to a large extent because of fossil fuels, economic growth and technological innovation benefit the vast majority of the world’s population.

Fossil fuels are critical to progress and economic growth because of their incredible energy density and the fact that they are affordable, easily stored and transported, reliable, controllable and easy to scale to fit needs. And because of these characteristics, their geographical limitations are radically less than virtually all other energy sources.

Before we try to eliminate fossil fuels, we need to make sure that we do not also eliminate all the benefits that have come from their use.

How Progress Works

Each of the metrics of progress examined in Chapter One involves the innovation of new technologies, the mastering of new skills required to build and use those technologies and the innovation of complex and diverse social organizations designed to most effectively apply those technologies and skills to solve a problem.

Virtually all of these innovations started in either Northwest Europe or North America.

Humans have a natural instinct to innovate, learn new skills, cooperate in groups, compete against other groups and copy each other. We need to consume energy to do so.

But these behaviors only lead to progress, when The Five Keys to Progress are present.

Most technologies are composed of many smaller technologies combined together.

Technologies can be recombined with each other to create new technologies.

The more technologies there are, the more possible combinations exist. This makes the rate of innovation grow over time.

Energy is essential for life.

For biological organisms, the ultimate source of energy is the sun.

Human societies also rely on large amounts of energy to survive and reproduce. Just as with other biological organisms, the ultimate source of that energy is the sun. Energy in the form of food is the most important.

Food is a form of energy that animals can consume to convert into useful energy to perform a behavior.

Fossil fuels are ancient sunlight stored in the ground.

Every technology requires a large number of skills. Skills to use it, design it, test it, produce it, fix it and many more.

So as the number of technologies grows, so must the number of skills grow even faster.

There are only so many skills that one person can possess. So as the number of technologies grows, we must specialize. Fortunately, the more we specialize, the better that we get at each skill.

Social organizations enable humans with different skills to work together to accomplish a common task.

Prices shift the focus from solving one’s own problems to solving other people’s problems. Prices enable strangers to cooperate and give them an incentive to do so.

Because there are limited resources, organizations are forced to compete against each other for survival. In the past, they competed over food. Now they compete for money.

Competition between organizations increases cooperation within organizations.

Competition between social organizations also fosters innovation and the desire to copy competitors to improve.

Societies that allow new social organizations to be created and old social organizations to die enable innovation to take place. This innovation leads to progress.

Large populations increase the chances of successful innovation.

Being connected to other societies and open to copying them helps good ideas to spread.

Innovations always start in one city and often take a long time to spread. This leads to inequalities between people.

This enables highly innovative cities to “pull ahead” of the rest of the world… at least until other cities can copy the innovators.

The conditions that are necessary to copy technology are very similar to the conditions that are necessary to innovate technology. If a society has the proper conditions, it will be able to innovate and copy the innovations of others at a far more rapid rate than other societies.

No matter what occupation or hobby you seek to enter, there is one Golden Rule of Success: Copy the Successful.

Ideally copy a wide variety of successful people, and then figure out what they are doing in common. When in doubt, err towards copying the most successful person.

Progress Is An Evolutionary Process

Progress is the most recent portion of an evolutionary process that goes back billions of years.

Physical/Chemical evolution is driven by the four fundamental forces: gravity, electro-magnetic force, strong and weak nuclear forces.

Biological evolution rapidly accelerates the complexity and rate of change on planet Earth.

Cultural evolution by humans adds in conscious design, trial-and-error experimentation, teaching and copying. It is no longer necessary to wait for accidental combinations to take place. We can create them.

Life Before Progress

The concept of Society Type enables us to overview human history without going into all the details that were only relevant in the short term.

A society type is a category for how a society organizes itself to transform energy and other natural resources into food and other useful technologies. This is most easily measured by how people acquire a majority of their calories.

The concept of society type is useful because with one simple label we can communicate a large number of important characteristics about any given society in history: population size, population density, political structure, economic structure and rates of innovation.

The society type is to humans what the natural environment is to animals: the critical environmental factor that drives evolutionary change. Among animals, that evolutionary change is entirely genetic. Among humans, that evolutionary change is genetic, cultural and technological.

Within society types, humans cooperate and use technologies to harness the power of the sun to acquire enough food to survive and reproduce within the local environment.

Hunter-Gatherer societies survive by hunting wild animals and gathering wild plants. Their key technologies are stone tools, digging sticks, language, bow-and-arrow, fire and cooking.

Human genetic change is accelerating.

Fishing societies survive by catching wild fish, gathering shellfish and hunting marine mammals. Their key technologies are fish hooks, nets, weirs, boats, kayaks and harpoons.

Fishing societies likely invented the first year-round villages long before agriculture was invented.

Horticultural (or gardening) societies survive by farming domesticated plants using hand tools and sometimes also raising domesticated animals. Their key technologies are the spade, hoe and other hand farm tools along with pottery, granaries and bronze weapons/armor.

Farmers rapidly remove nutrients from the soil, forcing them to migrate to new lands. This pushes Hunter-Gatherers out of their territory.

Agrarian societies survive by farming domesticated plants using animal-driven plows and raising domesticated animals. Their key technologies are draft animals, plows, writing, printing, extractive institutions, iron weapons/armor and later firearms.

All Agrarian societies relied predominantly on one staple food: The Middle East, Mediterranean and Europe relied mainly on wheat, while East, Southeast and South Asia relied mainly on rice.

Because of the bounty from these simple grasses, Agrarian societies all had large, dense populations compared to other simpler societies.

Elites in Agrarian societies were obsessed with status. These elites created centralized institutions that acquired their wealth by extracting resources from peasants through taxation and land rents.

Agrarian societies used the extracted resources to build powerful militaries. These militaries conquered vast empires.

Agrarian elites distrusted innovation because it potentially threatened their power and status.

Agrarian societies had a zero-sum mentality: “I can only benefit at the expense of others; if someone else benefits, that hurts me.”

Herding societies survive by herding domesticated animals on the open range. Their key technologies are the saddle, carts, wagons, chariots, and composite bow.

Herding societies often evolved into fearsome warriors, capable of conquering vast empires of wealthier people. Rather than creating wealth, they extracted wealth from agricultural societies through military conquest.

Geographical Constraints to Progress

Inequalities between societies today are caused by geography.

Inequalities between societies are not new. They go back as far as 3000 years ago! So current inequalities are not caused by current factors, such as institutions, political leaders, government policies, trade, colonial­ism, exploitation, or racism.

Geography placed hard constraints on the ability of humans to acquire food. The type and amount of food that could be produced either constrained or promoted the type of society that could evolve. Those society types, in turn, either promoted or constrained the innovation of certain technologies, skills, social organizations and values.

Geographical constraints created a poverty trap that persisted for millennia.

The most important geographical factor is biomes. A biome is a category for a geographical area based upon its dominant vegetation. The dominant vegetation in any area sets very broad constraints on what type of plants and animals can evolve there.

Since humans use a portion of these plants and animals as base materials for food production, biomes also play a critical role in constraining the types of human societies that can develop within them.

Biomes that made progress impossible are the Polar, Highlands, Tundra, Boreal Forest, Temperate Grasslands, Desert, Savanna and Tropical Forest biomes. Each made it impossible for humans to achieve the first key to progress: productive agriculture.

Progress was possible, but not inevitable, in the following biomes: Temperate Forest and Mediterranean biomes. Both made it possible for humans to achieve the first key to progress: productive agriculture.

Many of history’s most important cities have been located on the banks of great rivers.

The vast majority of humanity inhabits altitudes of less than 500 meters above sea level. These people are also richer than those living at higher altitudes.

Most land in the world does not have soil conducive to productive agriculture (the first key to progress).

Most regions have growing seasons that are too short for productive agriculture (the first key to progress). They are too hot, too cold, have too little precipitation or too much.

Being close to the Middle East enabled many regions to acquire plants and animals necessary for productive agriculture (the first key to progress). Those that were separated by oceans had no chance to do so.

Being close to the warriors living on the Central Asian steppe made many Agrarian societies in Eurasia vulnerable to military conquest and plunder.

Geographical Constraints by Region

Sub-Saharan Africa had many geographical constraints that made it impossible to evolve into Agrarian societies. This made it impossible for them to acquire The Five Keys to Progress without outside help.

The Americas had many geographical constraints that made it impossible to evolve into Agrarian societies. This made it impossible for them to acquire The Five Keys to Progress without outside help.

North America had almost all the necessary geographical factors to evolve into Agrarian societies, but the region was missing domesticatable animals capable of pulling plows. Once they acquired these animals from Europeans, the region grew spectacularly.

Southeast Asia had almost all the necessary geographical factors to evolve into Agrarian societies, and they were able to acquire domesticatable plants and animals from China and India.

Central Asia, New Guinea and Australia had many geographical constraints that made it impossible to evolve into Agrarian societies. This made it impossible for them to acquire The Five Keys to Progress without outside help.

The Middle East had all the necessary geographical conditions to evolve into Agrarian societies. In fact, the region invented agriculture.

East Asia, Mediterranean Europe and Northern Europe had almost all the necessary geographical factors to evolve into Agrarian societies, and they were able to acquire domesticatable plants and animals from the Middle East.

These favorable geographical factors enabled numerous Agrarian societies to evolve along a dense belt that stretched across Eurasia. Nowhere else in the world had the geographical conditions necessary to evolve into Agrarian societies, leaving them far poorer.

The Beginning of Progress

Six historical breakthroughs enabled progress to accelerate and diffuse to new parts of the globe.

A few societies in Northwest Europe were able to overcome geographical constraints, escape the poverty trap and generate progress for their people. These societies evolved each of the Five Keys to Progress. When each of the Five Keys to Progress is in place, a society becomes a vast decentralized problem-solving network that promotes progress.

Commercial societies survive by using their skills to sell a product or service, so they can buy food from the marketplace. Their key innovations were sailing ships, inclusive institutions, currency, banks, companies, bond markets and the stock exchange.

Commercial societies evolve when four of the five keys to progress are present (productive agriculture, trade-based cities, decentralization and export industries).

After the fall of the Roman Empire, no great empires dominated all of Europe. Instead, decentralized feudalism enabled Commercials cities to evolve.

Commercial societies evolved in Northern Italy, then Flanders (present-day Belgium) and then the Netherlands.

Southeast England copied technologies, skills and organizations from Flanders and Netherlands to become its own Commercial society.

Commercial societies are very innovative and willing to copy the innovations of other societies. Nothing like them had ever existed.

The Netherlands around 1670 was the wealthiest society before the Industrial Revolution.

European settlers, particularly British settlers to North America, brought the technologies, skills and organizations that made progress possible outside Europe.

In the 19th Century, Britain created the first Industrial society. Industrial societies are much like Commercial societies, except they use vast amounts of fossil fuels.

Industrial technologies, skills and social organizations enable people to overcome many, but not all, of the geographical constraints that previously undermined the possibility of progress. For the first time, people anywhere on the globe had the opportunity to experience progress. They could now escape the trap of geographical constraints.

Soon after the Industrial Revolution, Western Europeans and Americans copied the industrial technologies, skills and organizations from Britain. This rapidly spread progress to their people.

The Industrial Revolution was only possible because of Commercial societies, and they were not inevitable. Without Commercial societies, modern progress would not be possible.

Their Commercial histories enabled the UK and USA to win World War I, World War II and the Cold War.

Modern totalitarian regimes seek to use industrial technologies without the third key (decentralization of power). This dooms them to failure in the long term, but it makes them dangerous military adversaries in the short term.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, we have seen the greatest spread of progress that humanity has ever known.

Why We Ignore Progress

Citizens of wealthy nations are ignorant of world progress, and because of that, pessimistic about the future. The rest of the world gets it.

Skepticism of progress is not due to a lack of facts. It is due to cognitive biases in the human brain.

The media, politicians, interest groups, social media and ideologues have a strong self-interest in you not seeing the progress that surrounds you. Negativity and cynicism give them viewers, voters and money.

Most so-called crises are actually just one of the thousands of solvable problems. Let’s let the decentralized network solve them.

Current Constraints to Progress

Societies tend to copy other societies that are close to them geographically and culturally.

Monopolies tend to undermine progress because they have a lower incentive to innovate or copy successful innovations.

The more complex the society type, the earlier they industrialize and the richer they become. Societies can catch up by copying wealthier nations, but they have further to go because of geography.

It is geography and the resulting legacy of society types that explain modern inequality between societies, not race or racism.

Even the poorest groups can become wealthy by copying wealthier societies, but ethnic/religious/racial identities undermine their desire to do so. Leaders of poor nations and poor minorities have an incentive to promote resentment to preserve their power.

The biggest threats to progress are radical ideologies that deliberately intensify ethnic/religious/racial resentments against more successful groups. This undermines the desire of the poor to copy the rich (their only pathway to progress).

Radical ideologies undermine the foundations of progress by overly centralizing power and stifling diversity of opinion. This undermines the experimentation necessary to promote progress.

Conclusion

Barring an extinction event, progress is very likely to continue in the future. But it is up to you to decide whether you want to participate in it and enjoy the benefits of doing so. What do you choose?

To teachers: please let me know in the comments if you find these Key Insights useful in the classroom, and how I might make them more useful to your students.