Modern society tends to measure its potential future with the yardstick that applies to imperial, private monetarism. As the result we use a very small yardstick, because private monetarism is by design 'expense' oriented and is thereby a inhibiting factor, or at the very best a limiting factor. Unfortunately this is the only yardstick that society has known for the last half century. However, there exists another yardstick that is evident in every period of renaissance. This yardstick does not measure 'expense' as an economic factor, but measures instead the wealth-creating potential that is inherent  in a specific economic process. Simply put, one might discover a principle that can uplift an entire continent or two, or the world as a whole. In the monetarist world one would ask, can we afford it, and who will pay? In the 'free' world (free from monetarism) one would ask, can we afford not to do this, and how much would it enrich our world and our living in it?

For example, one might be attempted to say that it is efficient to connect Asia and the Americas via the proposed Bering Straight Tunnel. The project appears huge, but it is actually rather small. In fact, it is small enough that it would still fit into the limited sphere of private imperial monetarism.  It is also too small to rouse society to break itself free from this trap. In comparison, building an intercontinental floating bridge, like from Florida to Africa (7000 km), or from California to China (13,500 km), or both, would qualify as a project that would demand and empower a breakout from the time-honored trap that has kept everything small. In this case one would no longer ask, how much does it cost? One would ask, do the physical principles exist that allow this to happen, and how much would our world be enriched by it, from the global scale all the way down to the individual dinner table. On this platform of measurement, the 'small' projects will likely turn out to be the most expensive as their benefits are too limited. 

See: The Intercontinental Bridge.

Unfortunately, small is beautiful, as seen by the small-minded beholder who sings the modern economic song of windmill power and solar cell electricity, which only work when the wind blows and the sun shines, and even then affords little in benefits. Nuclear (fission) power in comparison provides a vast power flux for little effort. It enables high-temperature industrial processes that are not even possible on a lower scale, such as the utilization of basalt for large construction projects or the construction of brand new cities for millions with free high-quality housing. On a realistic platform the realized wealth for society from these large processes would be so enormously great, that it would be a crime not to realize these benefits, so that even in financial terms the tragedy of that unrealized potential would be enormously 'expensive.'

It has been said that at the present time, just to meet the existing needs, 5000 to 10,000 nuclear power plants would be required. But fission nuclear power isn't the ultimate, is it? It is just a step. Some time in the future, and potentially in the near future, fission nuclear power will likely be looked upon as comparable to wood-fired powered as in the days of steam engines. Nuclear fusion may give us a power density that is ten or a hundred times greater, both in flux-density and process-temperatures. The utilization of this power source would open up mineral resources that are presently locked up in the molecular bonds of the rocks that litter the global landscape. We are not there yet to utilize them. A few problems have been encountered in the magnetic plasma-containment in nuclear fusion experiments. Still, we have many options left open. However, we may well skip this interim step and jump directly to the top of the ladder. Since the entire Earth floats in a cosmic plasma of vast electric currents -- the currents that power the Sun -- the potential exists to tap into this galactic power system for our 'minuscule' needs (in comparison with the Sun). This potential is evidently quite real. 

See: The Electric Universe 

The Earth is the third planet in the solar system and is relatively near to the Sun, meaning that the electric-power potential has been significantly concentrated in our space by the electrically attracting process of the Sun. The Sun is understood to have a positive electric potential, and likewise our Earth. The same currents that power the Sun could easily power all human needs on our planet in perpetuity, provided we were to give ourselves the means to tap into them. The potential for creating a plasma channel from the surface of the Earth to the double layer plasma sheet that surrounds our plant is being demonstrated in the small thousands of times each single day in the form of lightning. Of course immensely more electric energy exists flowing in space than in the clouds. The existence of these electric currents in space has been well demonstrated by a NASA experiment that had trailed a long tether. The tether broke. The metal had been heated by electric currents to the breaking point.

So how big is small? Small-scale thinking is immensely big in terms of unrealized potential. Wood power energy would be king on this scale, followed closely by windmills, then coal and oil, and far down the line by nuclear fission power. Only when we attain the potential to tap into the galactic stream of electric power would our unrealized potential on this scale reach zero. By building the continental floating bridges (referred to above) as a stepping stone for world-development, utilizing new physical principles, new generation nuclear power systems, new waters systems, and new large-scale automated industrial production, our unrealized potential would likely shrink to a very small number. The present number of course, is monumental in size. It may be the biggest ever. In fact it is so huge that an unimaginably large portion of the human potential is totally wasted, like in unemployment lines, homelessness, poverty, sweat shops, malnutrition, slum living, crime, incarceration, de-education, war, genocide, and so on. 

So, how big is small? The 'small' that measures the unrealized potential is presently truly astronomical in size. But it doesn't need to remain that way, does it?

Rolf A. F. Witzsche