preface

Chapter 1: The Flat World Rediscovered
Chapter 2 Leaving Las Vegas
Chapter 3: The Church in the High Desert
Chapter 4: The Collapse of Metaphor
Chapter 5: False Gods
Chapter 6: The Betrayal of Optimization
Chapter 7 After the Gold Rush
Chapter 8 Babylonia

Acknowledgements
main

Optimization that has taken over the world
A desperately needed new approach

“A wonderfully timely book!”_Carl Newport
“Applied mathematicians challenge the zeitgeist of optimizing everything.” —Adam Grant

A mathematician who escaped Silicon Valley, the mecca of optimization
Things I witnessed and thought about on the road while crossing the world outside of data.

Optimization is the principle that makes the modern world work.
We can make and transport things cheaper and faster than ever before.
Optimized models power everything from airline schedules to dating sites.
Optimization is now deeply embedded in our material reality, as well as in the technologies and mindsets that shape what we produce there.
How did a single mathematical concept shape such a vast culture? And what are we losing in the efficiencies we gain? Coco Crum, fascinated by mathematical models, studied mathematics at MIT, worked as a data scientist in Silicon Valley, and founded and ran a science consulting firm.
I once pursued “more data, more models, more solutions” with burning passion, but somehow that romanticism gradually faded.
As the world became more obsessed with optimization, Crumb's inner distrust deepened.


My disillusionment was rooted in the excesses of the tech industry, but it didn't begin or end there.
I lamented the burden of corporate schedules and proudly clung to my old flip phone for nearly a decade.
While I was contemplating escaping Silicon Valley, I also began to wonder how I could bring that world down.
(Page 10)

In 2020, Crum suddenly began to question the values ​​of "optimization" and "efficiency" that he had been pursuing as if they were the right answer, and he began traveling around the United States, meeting people.
"The Illusion of Optimization" is the result of that fascinating exploration and adventure.
In this book, Crum traces the remarkable history of optimization, rooted in America's founding principles and present in modern society, through the colorful stories of people ranging from Silicon Valley entrepreneur Sam Altman and lifestyle guru and organizing expert Marie Kondo to farmers opposing GMO cultivation and indigenous people who have dedicated their lives to restoring the endangered buffalo.


The illusion that if you turn everything in the world into numbers, you will grow forever.
The bulldozer of optimization, disguised as efficiency and profitability, has buried 'leisure,' 'place,' and 'scale!'

“More.
Better.
“Faster.” This expression has taken over not only business but also everyday life.
New smartphones, upgraded every year, promise faster speeds and clearer picture quality.
Numerous diet and health companies promise to help you achieve your desired weight and body shape in a short period of time.
Any small business owner is inevitably asked when they will scale up and expand.
In this way, optimization has become the lens through which we view the world.
As a result, we look at everything in isolation, judging comparative advantage, performance, and productivity, and we refine all kinds of routines to be more efficient.
We utilize nature and design the world around us, shifting our focus from observation to control.
Above all, we dream of eternal growth, anticipating a destiny of ever-increasing progress and moving forward toward greater heights.


This momentum toward optimization was particularly evident in the United States.
It is no exaggeration to say that the United States is a country that thrives on optimization and is a mecca of efficiency.
A legion of efficiency experts and folk heroes, led by Henry Ford, convinced American politicians and the public that economies of scale could lead to greater prosperity.
One of the products is the extremely large-scale American agriculture.
That's why the first place Crum turned to to explore optimization was the sugar beet farms of the Dakota Plains, which produce massive amounts of sugar.
Thanks to machines that replaced human labor, robust seeds, and chemicals that warded off pests and diseases, farmland expanded endlessly and food became endlessly abundant.
In return, it was all too easy to ignore the fact that machines deplete the soil, chemicals are harmful to human health, and fertilizers pollute drinking water.


We have benefited from optimization while pursuing the single goal of efficiency and profitability.
The economy has grown, the population has increased, and the world has developed, but something feels empty.
The Dakota plains, covered with sugar beet crops, look somehow empty.
That's the flip side of optimization.
We have lost slack, place, and scale.
We have lost the sense of scale that allows us to choose the right place (land) to apply various farming methods, whether it is large or small, short-term or long-term, depending on our individual circumstances.
We, society as a whole, willingly agreed to this bargain, whether we knew it or not.
We once indulged in the sweet fruits of our labor, but now the price is slowly overshadowing us.


Depending on who you ask, the answer will vary, but we are now living in an age of anxiety, an age of narcissism, a fourth turning, or the fall of empires.
The neoliberal order and growth are coming to an end, authoritarianism is on the rise, and the curtain is rising on a dark age or climate catastrophe.
The sense of apocalypse is awakening.
According to Forbes, television programs with a pre-apocalypse theme are gaining popularity, especially among millennials.
Optimization has consumed our time, attention, and even our future.
We've filled our ships and our schedules, but we've left a gap as to why.
(Page 13)

“What if neither strengthening optimization nor escaping optimization is the answer?”
In an era where limitless development and continuous growth have stalled, we must face the "illusion of optimization" head-on.

Even non-mathematicians will likely sympathize with the disillusionment with excessive efficiency.
We strive to use our time and money as productively and sparingly as possible, but at some point we feel overwhelmed and frustrated when we encounter problems that cannot be solved through optimization.
"Am I doing the right thing? What is the right thing to do?" This feeling manifests itself in skyrocketing rates of depression and anxiety, increasingly visible breakdowns in supply chains and society, the high cost of working in big cities, and plummeting marriage and birth rates.
There's a pervasive sense that unbridled growth isn't for us, that we've lost some sense of agency despite the countless products of optimization—cheap products and high-rise buildings—but no viable alternative is in sight.
Optimization advocates argue that this discontent can be alleviated by increasing efficiency.


Those on the other side, on the other hand, counter that we must escape efficiency or nullify it altogether.
The problem, however, is that both methods perpetuate the advantage of optimization.
The first method is a deoptimization method, which actually strengthens optimization, while the second method maintains the advantage of optimization by cramming all the chips currently available into the past standard.
What if neither strengthening optimization nor escaping it is the answer? Our livelihoods, our quality of life, our relationships with others, and our way of understanding the world all depend on optimization.
But just because we can't leave optimization behind forever, ignoring the seething discontent and the sick and decaying nature and world is not the answer.
In this context, Crum argues that we must seriously consider what perspective and attitude we should adopt in order to move forward without being swayed or dragged along by optimization.

We cannot move forward unless we acknowledge the ruins that lie beneath the land where our illegally occupied mansions and air logistics hubs are being built.
Perhaps what we need to do now is not complete reconciliation or dissolution, but rather choosing a perspective.
(Page 278)

In this book, Crum persistently questions the worldview of 'optimization' that has taken over the world.
And in the end, it boldly suggests that neither blind acceptance nor radical resistance is the answer, and that we should let go of the very language of 'optimization' that surrounds us.
For those who feel the need to put the brakes on the breathtakingly rapid pace of technological advancement and the relentless drive toward growth and development, "The Illusion of Optimization" will offer an intellectual pleasure, allowing them to concretize vague concerns through a variety of experiences and examples, and an opportunity to shift perspectives they'd never even considered breaking.