Clive Thompson has an interesting article in Wired a short while back that explains why we can all rest easy: there are geeks like Bill Gates in the world who can have compassion on more than eight people at once.
Phew. I can finally get some sleep. I was seriously worrying what’s going to happen when oil supplies start to run out given that the entire world economy depends on it. No more. Oh and global warming? Fahgetaboutit! A geek will save the day because he can think in terms of mega, giga, tera, peta, exa, zetta, yotta — because .. wait for it .. his job demands it. Just to reassure us that he hasn’t just emerged from Gates’ backside, Clive does throw in an occasional aside as to how Gates is a drooling social bafoon — but don’t be fooled. This piece is little more than worshipping at the Gates throne.
Alternative Hypothesis
Gates is not a philanthropist because of some rare ability to count higher than the number of fingers and toes available to him. I propose there are four major reasons why he is doing charitable work:
- Melinda Ann Gates née French: the lengths a man will go for a woman are unbounded
- PR: public image of Microsoft has been slipping for well over a decade and putting a human face on it (instead of the nerdy face of a ridiculously rich techno-snob) is just good business
- Historical precedence: Andrew Carnegie, J. D. Rockefeller, Henry Ford, John D. MacArthur — the world may forget a CEO but when that CEO is a philanthropist, he will be remembered forever
- Guilt: to have so much and to keep it all to yourself while there is so much suffering in the world is pretty hard for the conscious to bear
Clive’s thesis is fundamentally flawed. It’s not that because Gates is a geek that he is trying to end preventable disease in so-called developing nations (a term I take great issue with). Gates was already set on giving his money to something. Like any smart investor, he was doing a search on where his money could get the most gain. From his commencement speech at Harvard:
“Imagine, just for the sake of discussion, that you had a few hours a week and a few dollars a month to donate to a cause – and you wanted to spend that time and money where it would have the greatest impact in saving and improving lives. Where would you spend it? For Melinda and for me, the challenge is the same: how can we do the most good for the greatest number with the resources we have. During our discussions on this question, Melinda and I read an article about the millions of children who were dying every year in poor countries from diseases that we had long ago made harmless in this country. Measles, malaria, pneumonia, hepatitis B, yellow fever. One disease I had never even heard of, rotavirus, was killing half a million kids each year – none of them in the United States.”
A more accurate thesis would be: more wise investors with a crapload of money will save the world.
Clive describes a psychological phenomenon whereby people give less and less to causes that involve more people. By nature, supposedly, we feel more compassion for the plight of a single person than for the plight of a group. How much money was donated to Hurricane Katrina victims? How much to victims of the tsunami in 2004? How much to victims and families of victims after 9/11? It seems to me that when people see a single victim of a disaster, they give more to that person, because when they see multiple victims, they feel that some authority should be taking notice of this and doing something about it. When that authority comes out and says, please help, they listen. Just like they listened for Katrina, the tsunami and 9/11. Just like they are not listening for Darfur, because there is no concerted media and political push for relief. There is the occasional story on Darfur and Bush drops a line here and there, but you don’t see Bush the elder and Clinton teaming up for commercials to help with this humanitarian crisis.
It doesn’t take a geek to save the world. In fact, geeks may very well end it if the Large Hadron Collider lives up to my expectations. Gates was in the right place at the right time to do something very important in the lives of millions of children in economically stymied countries (aka developing nations). Perhaps he should be applauded for that, but I don’t really think so. To whom much has been given, much will be expected. Gates should be thanked, and then he should be helped to finish the job.
